Dialogue and reconciliation between polarised / radicalised groups

The House of Peace Foundation is an NGO based in Wrocław, Poland. It runs programmes in the field of peace education, conflict management and peer mediation.

Since 2013, in close cooperation with the Municipality of Wrocław and the Municipal Social Assistance Center, it has been conducting pilot projects implementing conflict management methods in the Polish education system and in local communities.

The foundation is also managing the cross-sectoral ‘Romanian Roma Residents of Wroclaw Program’, which has been listed as one of ‘50 Out-of-the-box Housing Solutions to Homelessness and Housing Exclusion’ and has been presented as a good practice in Brussels during a meeting of the European Commission in 2019.

Type of Organisation: NGO

The aim of the practice is to create a safe space for dialogue (meeting and conversation) amongst groups from radical right wing to radical left wing in the city of Wroclaw and 3 smaller cities of Lower Silesia Region in Poland, using knowledge from the field of mediation and restorative justice. These are groups that would not have had the opportunity to meet in other circumstances.It is aimed to reduce polarization and escalation of social conflicts in local communities. Thanks to creating common space for understanding and decreasing common prejudices we prevent violence and further radicalization. The result of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine is a massive influx of war refugees into Poland. This has changed the social structure of the population in Lower Silesia (approximately one quarter of the population is of Ukrainian origin). The influx of such a large number of refugees in such a short period of time has caused many problems. After an initial burst of help from the Poles, many fears arose concerning access to the labour market and education, and the rekindling of old traumas and resentments surrounding the Volynian massacre. The Volhynian Slaughter is a subject that was not allowed to be discussed during the years of the communist regime. The stories about it were carried by family memory keepers who also carried the huge trauma. We have been diagnosing for many months that the subject of the Volhynian Slaughter, is an inflammatory topic and creates space for manipulation, especially by parts of the radical right milieu. We have created a think-tank with the aim of preparing the ground for Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation to defuse this tabooed and manipulative topic.

Stages of the dialogue between polarised groups:

1. Diagnosis on inflammatory subjects (media analysis and preliminary interviews with leaders of the social hubs of their community) 
2. Actors mapping (desk research and interview with opinion makers) and looking for allies, who are in good relation with extremist organisations (for example representatives of Catholic Church and Human Rights Commissioner) 
3. Preparatory process (individual meetings with representatives of extremist organizations open for dialogue, building relations and trust, introducing rules of dialogue) 
4. Dialogic process – cycle of meetings between up to 30 participants (closed group) on subjects that are important for the group led by qualified facilitators 
5. Individual mediation or smaller facilitated meetings around specific, problematic issues (for example members of LGBT community and members of the Catholic Church). 
6. Scaling, mainstreaming and systemic change - Equal Treatment Council and Restorative Justice Council in Wroclaw

Educational Podcasts and videos showing the challenges of local media and impact of language in the context of conflict escalation, Handbook „Model of building dialogue step by step“

Trainings and lectures about dialogue-building in radicalised environments.

Address

Fundacja Dom Pokoju,
Lokietka 5/1,
50-243 Wroclaw,
Poland

Contact person: Maja Zabokrzycka
Telephone: +48 731733614
m [dot] zabokrzyckadompokoju [dot] org (Email) | Website