During the 20 month in cooperation of 4 countries (Latvia, France, Germany, Czech Republic) a simulation game to work with radicalization will be made. Violent radicalization among young people has become a growing issue of concern in Europe and its neighboring regions. There has been a notable increase in hate speech, incidence of hate crimes and attacks on migrants and refugees, propaganda and violent xenophobia, as well as rise in religious and political extremism and terrorist attacks in Europe. All of these emerging concerns have highlighted the urgent need to work with young people, in order to identify and address root causes of extremism, and prevent their violent radicalization. The Project HASTAG will develop a tool in youth work to work with radicalization and develop critical thinking in the youth work. It is actual to have online tools to work with young people now days, but we discovered that in direct youth work in youth centers and in youth organizations and in different training's still non formal educational methods are necessary to work with the groups of young people. New methods to rise quality and develop competences in youth work are important. Objectives of the project: To develop the simulation game HASHTAG to work with radicalization and develop critical thinking to be used in f youth work. Testing the simulation game HASHTAG with different youth groups.2-3 testing events with minimum of 18 persons in the group in each country. To develop the simulation games HASHTAG manual which will include theoretical part about radicalization and critical thinking as an important element of avoiding radicalization, rules of the game, instructions for trainers, youth workers how to lead the simulation game. To develop Video material that will include information on the rules and instructions for simulation game HASHTAG, to be placed on youtube. To held a wide range of publicity and distribution activities for the project and simulation game HASHTAG. The main impact of the learning-partnership is that by this project we promote qualitative youth work by making new tool for work with radicalization - simulation game, as well by project publicity we will raise awareness in wider society about youth radicalization.
During 26 months, 4 organisations from Germany, Latvia, France and the Czech Republic cooperated to create a simulation game. The four partners are active at local, regional, national and European level in formal and non-formal education sectors and our target group of educational work also consists youth and young adults. In recent years we have noticed that many young people are attracted to anti-democratic behaviour. Anti-Semitic, racist and xenophobic attitudes seem to be on the rise, we observe an increase in Hate-Speech and violence. One reason for these attitudes could be that democratic decision-making processes are perceived by young people as too complicated and not effective. There seems to be a mediation problem, as populist promises of solutions are perceived as less complex. In this project, we have developed the simulation game #Hashtag with the help of experts from the field of method development as well as trainers from the participating organisations, with which can be used on the topic of anti-democratic behaviour from youth workers and teachers. The participants are divided into small groups and simulate decision-making processes. Their ability to discuss and compromise is trained and empathy is strengthened. It is important for us to evaluate the experience well so that it can be transferred to reality and the learning processes can be illustrated. We have designed the simulation game in such a way that it can also function in the narrow time frame of the school context, and we give examples of preparatory and follow-up exercises. A manual in German, English, French, Latvian and Czech has been produced in which we give both the theoretical basics and concrete pedagogical instructions. In addition, we have produced two videos that present the simulation game and the pedagogical explanations in English. The four participating organisations went through an intercultural process with the help of the Erasmus+ programme, we adapted our pedagogical realities to each other in order to create the common product in our respective cultural backgrounds. Together we developed a work plan divided into four phases: research and methodology development, testing and adaptation, the transcription of the results, the creation of an educational film and finally the dissemination of the results.