Contact to experts/visiting speakers

The experience of the peaceful "Wende" in 1989 awakened in many people the hope that a Germany without a military could be possible. This hope led people from various civil initiatives in Halle together to found the Friedenskreis in 1990. The Friedenskreis Halle e.V. is an group of people of differing world views, religions, nationalities and political affiliations. We see peace not as a state of being or as a distant goal, and not simply as the absence of war. Peace is for us a means to a common, just and non-violent life together in diversity, where the personal development and liberty of the individual is made possible. The conception of this life together is always a new experience. This is why we try to explore, find and pass on new ways of doing so, while never forgetting to question the same. We are consequently involved in education, peace-associated activities and in projects for civil conflict resolution on both the domestic and international levels. Our work is made possible by paid and voluntary staff and carried through donations and public subsidies. Our current programme and projects

• Seminars and educational programmes in the areas of communication, conflict resolution, mediation, dealing with violence and learning how to speak out
• Consulting for initiatives and projects
• Lectures and seminars on current peace-associated themes
• Civil conflict resolution through the development of an educational and encounter centre in Jajce, Bosnia.
• Work camps, youth encounters and volunteer work in the countries of the Balkans.
• Counselling on military service and conscientious objection
• Cooperation in activities and campaigns against militarisation
• Coordination of the initiative "Zivilcourage: Bündnis für Gewaltlosigkeit, Demokratie und Toleranz in Halle"

The Open School 21 offers students in and around Hamburg (Germany) a broad program for global education. It aims to raise their awareness of global correlations and realities. At the same time concrete options for action are created for and together with students that enable them to make a self-determined contribution to a sustainable development and more global justice. In the Open School there is the experience that one can make an important contribution to justice, environmental protection, peacekeeping as well as poverty reduction by oneself and that success in these areas is possible.

Open School 21 offers about 40 different workshops, project days, city walks and harbor tours on request. Topics of the Open School are globalization, human rights, poverty reduction, world agricultural trade, climatic change, flight and migration, fair trade, sustainable
consumption, child labor, colonial history as well as living conditions and environments in different countries.

The program of The Open School 21 is directed to school students from every grade and school form. The activities take place at the harbor, in different parts of the city, in the education center “Werkstatt 3” or in one’s own school.

The events are held by self-employed experts with abroad and migration experiences that come from the field of development cooperation, arts and science. For teachers, the Open School 21 offers consultation for global education, support for day-projects as well as materials for preparation and follow-up of events.

Arche noVa is an aid organisation that sets up humanitarian aid projects (Syrien, Irak, Libanon, Ukraine), development cooperation projects (Myanmar, Pakistan, Philippinen, Uganda, Äthiopien, Somalia, Mali, Kenia) as well as development education in the form of school projects on topics such as ‘water’, ‘world trade and globalisation’, ‘(international) conflicts’ and ‘humanitarian aid’.

RAA - regional centers for foreigners' concerns, youth work and schools in the German state of Brandenburg - is a non-profit organization based in Potsdam. We manage six "Regionale Büros für Integration und Toleranz" (BIT) (regional offices for integration and open-mindedness) and four other offices as well as regional and local projects. In 2004, we established "Globales Lernen/Entwicklungszusammenarbeit" (global learning and cooperation for development). For us, global learning is about raising awareness of the world as a whole, of interrelations between North and South, and about relating our everyday life to the lives of people in developing countries. RAA is involved in an enormous variety of development-policy projects. We offer working groups, workshops, and training for teaching staff, and support schools in organizing workshops for students. Long-term projects include supporting school partnerships between schools in Brandenburg and schools in Senegal, Zanzibar/Tanzania and Angola, as well as smaller-scale initiatives. "Begegnungen mit Sansibar" (meeting Zanzibar) is a project that combines education and cooperation for development. Since 1992, more than 160 adolescents and teachers have been given the chance to gain deep insights into another culture and to help promote interactions between Germany and Tanzania, and more will follow. The project in Zanzibar encourages participants to closely examine both the foreign culture and their own. It includes such diverse activities as the building of classrooms, theater projects, thematic research, workshops, seminars and continuous education for teachers. In Germany, the results of this work are available as educational materials, thus enabling our partners from Tanzania to present their life and their views in Brandenburg. In addition, RAA is in charge of organizing and holding the "Brandenburger entwicklungspolitische Bildungs- und Informationstage" (Brandenburg educational and informational days on development aid) as well as the education program of the 'Berlin Import Shop' fair.

ReachOut is an advisory centre for victims of right-wing, racist and anti-Semitic attacks. The organisation offers, among other things, advice on legal possibilities, consultation regarding financial support, psychosocial counselling, and accompanied visits to authorities’ offices, doctors, lawyers and the court. Furthermore, the project offers various educational programmes for disseminators in the area of adult and youth education. The aim is to sensitise the public for the dimension and the consequences of racism and right-wing extremism as well as to achieve solidarity with the victims.

EADI, the European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes, is the leading European network in the field of development research and training. EADI is a Europe-wide network of institutes, researchers and students of various disciplines in the field of development studies. It organises activities and offers facilities for the international exchange of knowledge and experience in the professional field. Its most prominent activity is a General Conference devoted to a topical issue every three years. The official languages of EADI are English and French. EADI is the prime professional association for development studies. As such it promotes: quality in research and education in development studies, the exchange of relevant information among members and with others, the strengthening of relevant knowledge networks at the regional and global level, and influencing both national and European decision-makers in the development cooperation field. EADI’s two objectives are, firstly, to generate and stimulate and exchange of information among European academics and researchers concerned with development issues and to develop contacts with researchers from other regions of the world. And secondly, to promote interdisciplinary studies on specific themes. EADI is financed by its members’ contributions, an institutional grant from the German government and other project-related subsidies and private donations. EADI receives core funding from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Co-operation and Development (BMZ) and the Land North Rhine-Westphalia / City of Bonn.

Networking of asylum and refugee policy initiatives

Equipment of the protestant land church in Wurttemberg for development related educational work.

The DEAB is composed of over 100 Third World Stores, Third World Groups and other organizations related to development policy in Baden-Wuerttemberg. It is the parent organization for action groups involved in development policy and it focuses on topics like debt remission, fair trade and development aid. The many DEAB representatives acting within diverse committees work constantly to foster basic human rights in developing countries. The DEAB is the oldest and largest German network related to development policy. Every organization or group in Baden-Wuerttemberg which is engaged in development policy and which promotes justice worldwide can become a member of the DEAB.

The SüdZeit is a DEAB magazine that sets new trends related to development policy within and outside of Baden-Wuerttemberg. This magazine is published quarterly and contains reports, portraits and detailed overviews related to development policy activities in Baden-Wuerttemberg. Part of the service section of the SüdZeit is available at www.deab.de, the regularly updated website of the DEAB.

The DEAB group advisors for fair trade in Mannheim, Bodensee-Oberschwaben and Stuttgart support volunteers who work in "third world" shops or are involved in our action groups. Each of these groups can contact our advising services in case of problems or questions concerning issues like moving to a new location, sales levels, group activities or possible cooperation with other groups in its region.

Furthermore, the DEAB can provide a "fair trade" stand for professional use at consumer fairs. It is also engaged in an international campaign for debt remission (www.erlassjahr.de). The DEAB is a founding member of the Germany-wide "attac" network.
The DEAB fights for a vision of worldwide justice that encourages everyone to live and act responsibly in business and political life so that people everywhere can live a life of dignity. The DEAB also provides information about social ills in our globalized world, shows how we are partly responsible for those problems, and promotes change for the better.