Policy Dialogue Programme

Overview

The Policy dialogue course aims at empowering Mediterranean CSOs in their mobilization capacities, and related skills on policy dialogue with institutions, in partnership with the Programme’s partner European Partnership for Democracy (EPD) and with the online participation of EU Delegations’ staff working on policy dialogue. The course allows for the sharing of a wide range of experiences. This capacity building activity focuses on specific policy issues that were chosen in line with the outputs of the Mapping survey research, namely: fostering democratic local governance and overcoming socio-economic inequalities.

Due to the restrictions resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic, the course was divided into three parts. Learning outcomes were in great measure achieved through the “theoretical” online sessions, as well as the recommended readings that were shared with the participants. A practical seminar on policy dialogue techniques, and additional support for research or pilot policy dialogue actions followed the learning course. See below:

Online preparatory course (October 2020 and January 2021)
Practical seminar (6 to 10 April 2021)
Additional component: Research contributions related to policy dialogue or development of “Back Home Action Plans”. This component was designed as a means of promoting concrete actions to implement the learnings from the course and introduced incentives for group-work that could stimulate further networking.

Goals

Offering technical expertise on fostering democratic local governance and on overcoming socio-economic inequalities; providing knowledge on related case-studies and best practices in the Mediterranean region,
Strengthening the networking capacities of beneficiaries and the regional dimension of their work,
Empowering participants by acquiring policy influence skills to impact on decision-making processes,
Fostering dialogue between civil society, institutional players and other stakeholders, including governmental officials -with the aim to change policies,
Enhancing exchange and cooperation between CSOs and EUDEL staff working on policies.

Accomplishments

The seminars focused on identifying and selecting interesting cases of fruitful policy dialogues related to the topic of the seminar and elaborating on challenges and tools for policy influence based on concrete experiences. A common structure and orientation to results have been key-elements of the seminars, while combining collective learning with a hands-on approach. The outcomes were the following:

48 registered participants identified through the Networks Mapping survey research,
40 direct beneficiaries completing the Course,
5 research papers elaborated by participants on the following topics:
Political participation of women in Egypt
- AR version
- EN version
Comparative study about constitutions in Arab countries
- AR version
- EN version
A dialogue about the Syrian impasse
- AR version
- EN version
About the fragile situation of Tunisian children after the Covid-19 pandemic
- AR version
- EN version
Improvement of Social and Solidarity Economy in Morocco
- AR version
- EN version
3 Back Home Action Plans developed by participants on the following topics: (1) Protecting women from harassment by ratifying the ILO’s Convention on sexual harassment at workplace, and women’s right to a non-violent environment (Morocco); (2) Promoting women’s economic rights, and stopping discriminatory policies making it difficult for women to escape the poverty cycle (Egypt); (3) “Developing local governments and local democracy policies to serve citizens”, with the objective of transferring powers to municipal councils in a decentralized manner (Libya).

Policy Dialogue Programme

Overview

Goals

Accomplishments

About the MDRE

About the CSFM

CSFM Partners

Ressources

Press centre

Opportunities

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