Description
Plural democracy is possible only through active involvement of women, including younger ones, but there are still not enough women involved in Slovenian politics. The objective of the project is therefore to help improve the situation with advocacy, public awareness raising and most of all through empowerment of younger women themselves. A research will be done to find out why more women aren’t entering politics, what are the obstacles they face and what is stopping them. Younger women - equipped with the practical manual “Politics for beginners” - will be mobilized to participate in capacity building workshops. The project is expected to initiate public discussion on the limited role and involvement of younger women in politics in Slovenia, encourage them for an active role in participatory democracy and empower them for active citizenship.
Summary of project results
The aim of the project was to promote and encourage Slovenian women to get involved in politics. To meet this end they produced a manual - Politics for beginners and a serial of articles were published during the project. They initiated public discussion on the limited role and involvement of women in politics. The duration of the project should be just before the parliamentary elections in Slovenia and should therefore encourage political parties and women to get involved, but due to the early elections the project was slightly modified. They adopted their activities and added some monitoring and analysis of the election campaigns. Additionally they monitored how many women experts participates in debates in the national media informative shows. Based on their research some media has changed their policies and are now inviting more women experts to their shows. Additional impact of the project was that the project leader and partners got an invitation to participate as an expert in the governmental board of experts for gender equality. Outputs: - study visit to Iceland - 3 project proposals (among them also another project co-financed by EEA Grants - Obtaining Political Equality by New Names – OPENN, lead by Slovenian Peace Institute) - 2 round tables organized - 16 articles published - research on the reasons why young women don't participate in political life implemented - results of the research published - manual produced and published - 5 workshops organized - 1 international conference organized (in the proposal only video-conference was planned but then they decided to have a live event with an expert from Iceland coming to Slovenia). They also added live streaming to the conference with 600 viewers during the stream! - 5 promotional videos published on youtube Beneficiaries - young women - were main participants in all events that were organized in the framework of the project.
Summary of bilateral results
Icelandic partner was responsible for giving consultation, helping with the organization and implementation of the study tour and for preparing a video conference. During the implementation a video conference was up-graded with an actual visit of Slovenia by Mrs Brynhildur Heiðarog ÓMARSDOTTIR. The presentation of good practice for the involvement of women in politics from Iceland was very well attended - the conference room was full - they had to rent bigger one than initially planned. Additionally, around 600 people were following the conference by live stream and for Slovenia this a really big number. During the her visit she also met with officials from the Ministry of Labor, Family, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities and some non-governmental organizations.