BIPPI
B's Independent Pro-Peace Initiative

Description of the project
 

Introduction

I. The project: motivations and content

II. General information about a thematic camp

A. Organisation of a camp
B. Local hosting project (LHP)
C. Coordinator
D. Participants
E. Language

III. Plan of the project

II. General information about a thematic camp

A. Organisation of a camp

Any camp is organised in a partnership between a local hosting project (LHP) and BIPPI.
LHP is providing food, lodging, insurance, 3/4 hours daily work in partnership with a local community, internet connection, equipment (papers, pencils, copies, TV and so on) needed for the activities about education to peace, any necessary reimbursement.
BIPPI is providing a coordinator (or pedagogical animator) that could eventually be even technical animator, material (documents and supports) and contents needed in the workshops and seminars concerning education to peace, the preparation and the follow up of the camp.

B. Local hosting project (LHP)

The ideal LHP is a free non-profit association of citizens, without any political or economical link, working on local development in partnership with local public communities. It is member of a net of associations able to join people worldwide, to spread the information about the workcamps and to recruit fifteen volunteers among international youngsters. It has contacts with groups of local people, so that the coming international volunteers will be meeting these groups.
LHP is able to provide everything for the necessities of the camp (sleeping place, meeting place, and so on).

C. Coordinator

As already said, BIPPI will provide a coordinator trained to achieve her/his tasks. When necessary, the coordinators will be two. The coordinator will be a volunteer, she/he will participate to the preparation of the camp and will receive from BIPPI the necessary tools and knowledge. She/he will not be a so-called leader, but somebody trying to make everybody feel comfortable, enjoy the camp, learn from the others and from the activities, have part in the development of the project.

The coordinator will have five tasks:

• supporting the whole group and any individual in daily problems such as cooking, shopping, health care, organisation of tourist visits, parties and so on;

• driving the group to bring to an end the manual work if no technical animator is provided by LHP;

• driving the group through activities concerning self-development and education to peace, attentive to the response of everybody and concentrating on a very strong group building up;

• making out of the group a text on the chosen topic, to be put on the internet where everyone agree;

• last but not least, being part of the group, participating to the collective life, to the work, to the problems, to the fun.

D. Participants

Every camp will be joined, as any average workcamp, by about fifteen youngsters 18/25 years old, coming from several different countries. The participation of few older people will be eventually admitted.
As already said, the information about the workcamp will be spread on the existing worldwide net of international volunteering.
The participants will send an application form and they will be allowed to join the camp according to their motivation.
No particular knowledge on the chosen topic will be previously asked, since the effort to diffuse knowledge and educate to peace is the aim of the project itself.
No particular language has to be spoken since we can’t continue to look at communication among foreigners as a problem, in such a multicultural society.
The volunteers will pay their own travel fees to join the camp and go back home. A special sponsored fund will be created to allow youngsters from less developed areas to participate. In the camp they will be taken in charge by the hosting project, they will have food, lodgement, some facilities and insurance for the work and the activities.
The group will interact with local youngsters which will hopefully participate to the work.
On each camp the volunteer will work on a particular conflict in the world, BIPPI will prepare a text about the chosen topic, to be put later on the internet. Task of the group will be:

• verifying that the text to be put on internet is simple and correct, that nothing important is missing, that nothing not important has too much place;

• verifying that the history is written in a neutral way, without supporting the ideas of one of the parts involved in the conflict rather then the ideas of the other parts, since the way things are said can change the meaning of them;

• verifying that all the opinions involved in the conflict are well expressed, so that everybody reading the text will easily find the true reasons of all the belligerents;

• verifying that the conflict is put in its true political, cultural and historical frame;

• researching and suggesting all the necessary links to information and documents sites, so that everybody reading the text can verify that what has been said is true;

• suggesting any possible change that could help the understanding of the dossier;

• suggesting any possible insert (maps, introductions, links, whatever…) that could help the understanding of the dossier;

• diffusing the knowledge of the initiative.

E. Language

Some words more needs to be spent about the language.
Many people think that it is impossible to be part of an international workshop without perfect spoken English. This is absolutely untrue!
First of all, we live luckily in a multicultural society. Most of the European youngsters speak at least two languages; many times they speak four or five. It is impossible to foresee which will be the common language in a group of international people.
In France, in a small town called Taizé, lays an ecumenical community. Thousands of youngsters meet there every week from everywhere in the world, they mix themselves in small groups of ten people and talk about philosophy, religion and life. Going around the camping we can hear workshops in English as well as in French, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, German, and also other languages. In the plenary sessions everything is translated in several languages without any help by professional translators. And all this works perfectly, at the presence of hundreds, sometimes thousands of people.

Language, as the most visible manifestation of the cultural diversity, is at the same time one of the biggest richness of humanity and one of the causes of conflicts in the world. Learning how to deal with it is for everyone a big lesson about education to peace.