Roma Civil Monitor Consortium meets in the city of Mikulov, Czech Republic [editar]
Meeting of the Consortium of the Roma Civil Monitor 2021-2025 project, composed of CEU Democracy Institute, ERGO Network and Fundación Secretariado Gitano, for the coordination of the initiative's activities.
Partners from CEU Democracy Institute, ERGO Network and Fundación Secretariado Gitano reviewed the state of play of the Roma Civil Monitor project (RCM) and the national capacity-building plans, based on the needs assessment created by the national coalitions of Roma and pro-Roma CSOs of the project. These training plans will contribute to the capacity of the CSOs to develop advocacy to bring Roma rights to the political agenda and improve the situation of Roma in their countries.
During these meetings, we have also planned the call for proposals for small projects of the initiative and the 2024 country monitoring reports. The strategy for countries with challenges and the next steps of the RCM implementation were also planned during these days of work.
The RCM is a project managed by the European Commission’s Directorate-General Justice and Consumers (DG Just) that contributes to the ambitious objectives of the EU Roma Strategic Framework for Equality, Inclusion and Participation in several ways:
- Strengthening the capacities of the Roma and pro-Roma civil society to provide independent monitoring, assessment and reporting on national strategies for Roma equality, participation and inclusion, their implementation, as well as other policies with impact on Roma,
- Supporting participating civil society organisations and activists in their advocacy work aimed at making the public policy more effective in fighting the Roma exclusion and participation, as well as communication of the independent monitoring’s findings to keep governments accountable in the field or Roma inclusion policy
- Empowering the Roma and pro-Roma civil society to engage in dialogue and cooperation with public authorities responsible for the Roma inclusion, equality, and fight against racism.
The RCM builds on the lessons learnt and good practice from the RCM pilot project 2017-2020 implemented by the Central European University, in partnership with the members of the current project’s consortium and the Roma Education Fund. Innovations of the new project include a ‘cascade model’ aimed at strengthening the coordinators of the national civil society coalitions, more actions aimed at capacity-building of the members of the national coalitions and their systematic support in engaging in the dialogue, advocacy and cooperation with national stakeholders.
The RCM 2021-2025 project with the full title “Preparatory action – Roma Civil Monitoring: Strengthening capacity and involvement of Roma and pro-Roma civil society in policy monitoring and review” has been initiated by the European Parliament and is funded by the European Commission’s Directorate-General Justice and Consumers (DG Just).