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"I learned things that I think many adults don't even know how to do," Scarpelini said, noting that during the Gincana he learned how to write a project proposal, raise funds, manage money, and even speak before a city council meeting. "I went in thinking it was just a game and came out a real citizen."
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Informational books on health, peace and the environment produced by Aracati give youth access to information for developing their projects
Now 18, Scarpelini is considered one of Santos's premier youth leaders, and its initiatives have gone national and international. Joining with other youth leaders in the state of Sao Paulo, Scarpelini cofounded the citizen organization KwarupYouth Leadership.
It takes its name from an indigenous rite of passage meaning "new life." Kwarup helps promote youth involvement in local, national, and international decision-making processes on development issues. Kwarup is solicited by international bodies like the UN to select and organize delegations of youth activists to participate in their conferences.
Creating a Ripple Effect
"The Gincana taught us how to deal with problems and obstacles," said Darline Rocha, another Gincana participant. "It taught us how to go after our own dreams for ourselves and our community."
Darline's group "Attitude" designed and implemented an environmental clean-up project for the marshland where she and many of her poor classmates live in precarious stilt houses. Together, they hauled out 300 pounds of cans, bottles, and plastic bags that the residents had literally dumped in their own back yards.
As part of the learning process, it is important for young people and the community to see the positive results of these projects, Martinelli notes. But even more important than the number of cans recycled are the democratic values that young people absorb along the way.
"Simple things like prioritizing dialogue over violence, being proactive, respecting differences," she said. "This is what lasts and what can change a culture from one generation to the next."
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Gincana participants learn democratic values like dialogue and tolerance
Aracati believes that empowering youth is just the starting point for making waves in a community. Other actors must be brought in to create a ripple effect. In Santos, Aracati worked with the schools' administrative and teaching staffs, and it involved key actors in the city government, the citizen sector, and the media.
One of these participants is Santos journalist Gustavo Klein. During a 50-week period, he published 52 articles in the Tribu, a youth-focused newspaper section of the city's most popular daily, that covered the youth groups participating in the Gincana. "The Gincana physically showed that youth can," he recalls. "You would go around the city and see banners outside the different schools saying 'I participate!'"
In the local government, Anamara Simões Martins, Santos's Secretary of Community Action, was Aracati's key partner for mobilizing the city. "I was behind the Gincana 100 percent," she said. "The Gincana sparked youth participation in the city, giving us the push needed to advance and integrate our programs that assist youth."
The city government's participation in the Gincana led directly to enactment of a law that established a pioneering initiative in Brazil: Municipal Youth Commissions. They comprise youth leaders and adults and today are consulted on all youth-related city policies.
Before the Gincana, Santos had plans to build its first youth center, but it didn't have a strategy for involving young people in the process, Martins said. Now, the Youth Commission is on the job.
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A young participant in Gincana speaks to city government and opinion makers at the inauguration of the Municipal Youth Commission of Santos
After two years the Gincana project ended. It had sparked 23 youth-led projects and mobilized the city to support youth participation. In recognition of these achievements, it won the Inter-American Development Bank's award for one of four best practices in youth volunteerism in all Latin America.
Aracati made it a priority to systematize these experiences and make them available to others. The steps, history, and tools used during the Gincana da Cidadania, plus a list of all participating youth groups and their projects, are available in Portuguese on the Web site: www.gincanadacidadania.org.br. Today, this site serves as the primary tool for responding to numerous requests from teachers, school principals, and government authorities from across Brazil on "how to" run a Gincana in their town.
From Beneficiaries to Instigators
Aracati has continued to test new ways of promoting youth participation since the Santos project ended. In 2003 it joined forces with Ashoka Innovators for the Public to design and implement a project that contributes to the development of young social entrepreneurs.
The project, Jovens em Ação, (literally "Youth in Action") takes young people who have been beneficiaries of four citizen organizations (headed by Ashoka Fellows) in four cities near São Paulo and makes them instigators of their own social change projects.
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A Jovens em Acao participant works with her group to identify the objective of their project
By working with citizen organizations, Aracati is reaching youth outside school settings and is converting citizen sector organizations into incubators for youth-led social initiatives. "Jovens em Ação helps the organizations create new spaces for youth participation where they learn how to entrepreneur their own ideas," notes program coordinator Paulo Freitas.
At present, 51 young people in four groups are in the final stages of structuring and implementing their own solutions to problems in their communities, while interacting via visits and an interactive Web site with their counterparts in other cities. The 22-member group "Urban Scream" is linked to the Children At-Risk Foundation and is creating a monthly public-debate program that uses hip-hop, graffiti, and theater to promote communication about issues like police brutality, racial discrimination, and sexuality in the community. In another city, 11 youths are working with Ashoka Fellow Leila Novak's waste management project and have formed a group called "Youth Incentive" that is establishing the city's first youth center.
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Members of the "Youth Incentive" group pose at work. Their youth center is scheduled to open next month and will offer workshops in hip-hop and graffiti art for poor youth in the community.
Aracati: Agency for Social Mobilization was born of the marriage of two like-minded citizen organizations. Martinelli founded one of them at age 23 in order to get school students active in their communities. The other organization used communication as a tool for promoting social change. The two came together with the common goal of developing a culture of participation in Brazil.
Today, Aracati is led by three "under-30" directors who have a combined 30 years of social action under their belts. Besides leading direct projects like Gincana and Jovens em Ação, Aracati works indirectly with communities and youth across Brazil by helping other organizations do what it does best: promote social mobilization and ensure youth participation.
The fragmentation and discontinuity of Brazil's local social and economic policies contribute to its poverty and inequality, according to Aracati director Antonio Lino. "When a new mayor comes into power, a program's future is subject to party platforms and a series of favor exchanges," he explains.
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Aracati director Antonio Lino shows community members how to develop social mobilization plan for their county
"You need to create a mass of people who are involved in local processes independent of political parties in order to give continuity to local development." Under Lino's direction, two local organizations in Brazil's Northeast became catalysts for mobilizing citizen organizations, local government authorities, and young citizens across nine counties to curb rural-urban migration by creating dignified employment opportunities for youth.
Fanning the Winds of Change
Looking to the future, Aracati's leaders hope to unite these and other youth-led initiatives into a larger movement. The Brazilian government is waking up to the fact that young people aged 15-24, representing one-fifth of Brazil's population, must be involved in the country's development.
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Young and old, community members participate in processes of social mobilization in Brazil's northeast
The federal government is now launching the Youth Secretariat, Brazil's first federal department directed at coordinating youth-related policies. However, unlike Aracati, it does not yet have a clear strategy for preparing young people to take part.
The logic of social mobilization unites all of Aracati's efforts. It begins when people young and old are empowered to change their lives and their communities; it then increases the number of actors involved and merges these energies into a common vision of the future.
To get people moving requires a powerful force just like the aracati wind that inspired the organization's name. It is the wind that blows through the drought-stricken Northeast of Brazil, passing through town after town and cutting the heat of the late afternoon.
As the breeze passes, people stop what they are doing and come out of their houses to take in the fresh air. It is a moment when neighbors meet people, young and old, get together and interact. Aracati is a powerful breeze; its name means "good winds."
In another corner of Brazil, Aracati is doing just that: getting people up and out of their homes to participate in building a common future, one where young people are the drivers of social change.
Footnote:
- Ação Educativa, "Pesquisa sobre Controle Social de Politicas Publicas," 2003.
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- PNUD, Democracia nas Americas, April 2004.
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- IPEA Institute of Applied Economic Studies (Brazil).
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- Jornal do Brasil, July 15, 2004.
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- Ação Educativa, "Social Control of Public policies," 2003.
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Contact:
Luciana Martinelli
Executive Director
Aracati
Rua Mourato Coelho, 460
Pinheiros
05417-001 São Paulo/SP
Brazil
Tel: (55) (11) 3031-1133
Fax: (55) (11) 3819-8593
Email: contato@aracati.org.br
Web site: www.aracati.org.br www.gincanadacidadania.org.br
Claire Fallender is an international development consultant who has been a member of Ashoka's team for six years. She is currently based in Rio de Janeiro and focuses on developing youth social entrepreneurship programs in Brazil.
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- MelJol: Different Worlds Coming Together, by Arundhati Ray
- And Ne'er the Twain Shall Meet?, "Twinning" children from different walks of life, by Jerry Pinto
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- Redefining Women: Three Generations Work Together in West Bengal, by Manisha Gupta
- Taking Charge (Poland), by Steve Owad
- Teaching Teen–Agers to Really See Society, and How to Fix It (an Overview), by Julia Sommer
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- Working Children Get Organized: Bidding for Power and Respect (an Overview), Excerpts from Anthony Swift
- Young Mediators Help to Bring Peace to Lawless Medellìn, by Steven Ambrus [Versión en español]
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