The
Origin and Aims of the Roma Cultural Mediation Project (RCMP):
The idea of a cultural
mediation project focusing specifically on the Roma
population developed during the JOIN partnership where the Roma
population was already a core interest. One of the organisations taking part
in the venture was indeed a Roma organisation from Germany. Access Ireland had
not yet trained any cultural mediators from the Roma population and was eager
to extend the programme to the Roma community. In addition, through the requests
that the organisation received from different Irish service providers, Access
Ireland learned that there was a great need for cultural mediators from the
Roma population.
EQUAL Community Initiative provided Access Ireland with the opportunity to develop
a Cultural Mediation programme tailored specifically around the needs of the
Roma people living in Ireland. The project’s overall aims are to give
Roma people greater equality of access to health, social, educational and probation
services, and more benefits from their utilisation of them, as well as to develop
appropriate professional skills and intercultural competence among service providers.
The project has two main objectives:
The Development Partnership of the Roma Cultural Mediation Project (RCMP) consists of the following organizations:
The RCMP also participates in
a Transnational Corporation Agreement (TCA)
called TRIALOG with organisations
in Belgium, France, Slovakia and Spain. The aim of this agreement is to reach
a better understanding of the social situation of the target groups and their
experience of social exclusion. Furthermore, it is a forum in which the partners
can learn from each other’s specific experience and expertise gained during
the development process of cultural mediation in a particular country.
Background on the Roma Population in Ireland:
The target group for the RCMP is the population of Roma people in Ireland, who have arrived over the last decade as asylum seekers. There are no definite statistics available (due to lack of information on asylum seekers’ ethnicity), but the Roma Support Group estimated around 3.000 Roma in Ireland in early 2005.
Since the fall of the Communist governments in the late 1980s, the situation for Roma people worsened in their countries of origin. Especially the transition to a market economy led to the marginalisation of the Roma.
Because of their experience of hostility and violence from majority populations in their central and Eastern European countries of origin, Roma people are often reluctant to trust state services and institutions. Therefore, both statutory and NGO service providers in Ireland are facing difficulties in gaining their trust and in encouraging them to use the services on offer.
In addition to this, language barriers but also cultural differences can lead to misunderstandings and misinterpretations which can make communication between service providers and clients much harder and which often prevent clients to use the services at all.
The RCMP is a project which focuses especially on these cultural barriers and communication problems. It provides a cultural mediation service which is specifically designed to respond to the needs of the Roma and the service providers. By training members of the Roma community in Ireland the project both empowers this particular minority ethnic community while at the same time assisting service providers in providing a culturally sensitive and competent service.
The Training Programme
The cultural mediation
training programme which has been developed as part of the RCMP is an evolving
programme utilising a “learning-by-doing”-approach. In the initial
phase two Roma participants were recruited and trained, and they provided crucial
input on the needs and priorities of the Roma community. Thereby, a two-way
exchange of knowledge took place through which the training programme could
be developed further.
The initial training programme consisted of a combination of preparatory ‘classroom’
sessions held by speakers with experience in particular areas relevant to the
training in cultural mediation and site visits.
This training programme is transferable and is now again the base of the currently running follow-up cultural mediation programme within the framework of the RCMP, in which additional selected Roma individuals are being trained. One of the original participants is now involved as a peer educator in the development and extension of the original training package, and additional training areas have been added according to the findings during evaluations of the first training programme.
The Cultural Mediation Service
By now (September 2006) a substantial number of cultural mediation sessions have taken place and the service is being used by a growing number of service providers as well as by members of the Roma community. This has contributed immensely to better mutual understanding on both sides.
So far the RCMP
has received very positive feedback from both service providers as well as members
of the Roma community. For example, a dietitian from Temple Street Children’s
University hospital expressed that she would not have been able to complete
her job without the help of a cultural mediator. A representative from the HSE
stressed the valuable contribution that cultural mediators make to all parties
involved (Information taken from RCMP service provider questionnaires). Many
Roma clients have expressed their appreciation to our mediators for assisting
them in the resolution of their issues.
Feedback like this plays a vital part in developing the RCMP further and continuously
adapting the training programme for new cultural mediators to both the needs
of service providers and the Roma community.
In addition, the growing number of trainees reflects the need for and the growing interest in cultural mediation.
In case you would like to get more information about the RCMP or use the Roma cultural mediation service please contact:
Mayte Calvo
mayte@accessireland.ie or call +353-01-6708918