"Thinking of Linking?"

Are you one of the many community groups, schools or local authorities thinking of linking with a partner organisation in the South?

Below you will find a number of questions based on the experience of UKOWLA members which you may find useful and which are worth discussing with your partners.

There are no "right" answers and the comments quoted from Southern participants at UKOWLA conferences give additional insights into this challenging and immensely rewarding cross-cultural activity. You will also find it useful to meet with people from other link groups and talk to nationals living in the UK from the countries with which you hope to link.

"Links can be the bulldozers of cultural barriers and prejudice"

The new The Toolkit of Good Practice - Opportunities and Challenges has been published in draft. We need your help in adding to it! You can download the toolkit from the above link.

What kind of group are you?

• What range of backgrounds do you represent?
• How many young people, women and men, in the group?
• What ethnic background do they come from?
• What range of politics and religion do your group represent?
• Does your group reflect your community?
• Do you have the skills in your group that you need e.g. legal, financial, public relations, fund-raising
• Are you constituted? Do you have charitable status?
• Can you answer the same questions about your partner group?

"The growing number of communities involved in European East / West twinnings should consider implementing their programmes in partnership communities in the South. And wherever possible, the West and the East should support South / South decentralised action"

Your Partner Group

• What previous or existing links do you have with the partner community?
• How did they come about?
• Have you (and they) a checklist of what information is needed about a partner group before deciding to initiate a link?
• Does the partners group know enough about you to enable them to make a choice?
• How are both groups making their choices and decisions about the link?

"The primary preoccupation of developing communities is improvement of economic and technological standards. Whatever we do and envisage in the linking movement we cannot lose sight of this primary goal"

Economic and political background

What do you know about the local and national politics in the link country? Is it a military dictatorship,, a one party state, a pluralist democracy?

Is the country at war with another country, at war with itself, divided into numerous political factions? What is its record on human rights?

What do overseas groups need to know about the role of national and local government here? (The role of local authorities may be very different, for example)

"The existing world order is structured and controlled to benefit the North; it will be impossible to change this injustice without constant popular pressure at grass-roots level"

The purpose of the link

• What is the purpose of the link?
• What do you hope to get out of it?
• Do you know what the partner group expects to get out of it?
• Could the needs of the two groups be incompatible?
• How could the differences be discussed and resolved?

"If you deceive yourself - then you suffer"

"Linking is about living together and sharing"