One of the most important challenges of our times is migration and how to live together in peace but with all our differences.
The history of mankind is a history of migrations. In all times of human history some folks fled from hunger and war. They stood up, thought of the possibility of a better life at the other side of the mountain, far beyond the river and they walked their ways, builded up new cities and civilizations.
In our times we have more migrations, the migrations have more power, more energy, more strength. Turkey is just on the way between the rich world and the poor world, and in all times someones who got weak on the migration paths sat down, they stayed and settled here. And with the rich world closing its borders the migration paths now will find an end on these lands.
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Migration will also question the concept of the national state, which actually never was successful on these lands.
If we don’t want that these migrations lead our society – which is actually unstable and vulnerable – into racisms and violence we have to think about how to live together with respect to our differences.
When doing this we have to look back, to face our difficult pasts and to remember the good days, to remember whilst learning and to heal ourselves whilst remembering.
And we have the will to hear about and to learn from the practices of other countries.
We will never be able to build up democracy if we don’t take a shared responsibility for these lands, if we don’t share but race our remembrances, if we don’t leave our milieus and continue to feel superior to the others.
Democracy desires peace.
Democracy desires a collective responsibility, shared remembrances and all together generated practices.
A collective memory desires a remembrance which embrace the “other one”. If we want to live in peace and serenity we must have the courage to face not only our memory, but to face the memory of the other ones, of the other groups as well.
How will we successfully build up a shared collective memory?
How will we learn to understand the other one?
We will examine the dynamics which turn an innocent baby into a bloody murderer. Will we be able to accept, that our challenge is not to judge the murderer but to comprehend the processes and dynamics, to say “never again” and to understand the murderer?
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To build up democracy, how will we become democrat peoples?
Beraberalan aims at building up an independent and free space to discuss all these questions.
