Bosnia and Herzegovina

We, young people of diverse religions and spiritual expressions, coming from different cultures and tradition backgrounds from Bosnia and Herzegovina, have established Youth for Peace to promote dialogue, interfaith and inter-ethnic cooperation, to end all kinds of violence and to create a culture of peace and justice for youth.

We are striving to have empowered young people who will be initiators and promoters of positive changes and will create a better future through building a society of equal opportunities without prejudices.

MISSION: Giving support to youth growing up into psychical and moral healthy, responsible, educated and economically secured adults, living into an equal, justly and healthy society. GOALS: 1.Supporting youth to reach their full physical, intellectual, spiritual and social possibilities 2.Encouraging them to be loyal to spiritual principles 3.Developing youth loyalty to their country 4.Developing the love and fancy for nature, sensibility for healthy life 5.Developing mutual people respect with all kinds of diversity 6.Making education available to everyone 7.Ensuring youth multicultural and education exchanges 8.Supporting youth enter into the labour market 9.Civil society development 10.Strengthening cross sector partnership

The decision to found and register this centre was made based on the neglected needs of youth. Most of the NGOs in Bosnia and Herzegovina had been working in cooperation with international organizations or institutions, but youth organizations were left to themselves. Most of them did not know what to do in that situation and had to close their offices. This was a common scenario for youth organizations in smaller communities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which were not able to fulfill basic needs of young people without adequate help. ORC Tuzla will offer support and help to all youth organizations in need of assistance.

The lack of contacts and cooperation between the youth organizations in BiH has also motivated us to start with this initiative. Special attention was directed towards young people that live in small communities and cities in BiH, a mission that still lives on to this day. Since 2004, ORC Tuzla has continued with this project and has made it a trademark of sustainability for youth projects in BiH.

The mission of the Organisation is to provide assistance to women during the post-conflict period to help them to rebuild their lives. The organisation Women for Women International provides moral and economic support to women to enable them to become financially independent and strengthened, and to underline the importance of their role in the family, the community and Society as a whole. Many of these women have, with our help, found the courage to start their own businesses and to employ not only members of their families, but also members of the local community.

BiH society does not recognize women's rights as human rights. Women's NGOs promote women's human rights as a priority and significant element of BiH society in order to point out the state of social women's needs in relation to health protection, social care, employment, health, accommodation, education and non-discrimination.
In BiH the scope of women's human rights depends more on political and economic situation in the country than on legislation based on international human rights documents.
The difficult social context disables realization of rights guaranteed by local legislation and international conventions and declarations. There are many examples of violation of women's human rights.
Most of women are not informed about possibilities that certain laws and institutions can provide.
Žene Ženama has played a very important role in civil society development in BiH in area of understanding of the concept of «democracy» and «human rights».
By working on improvement of lives of women and other marginalized groups and individuals, we recognized disharmony between speeches of politicians about gender equality and their rejection to accept women out of their traditional roles. It stimulated us to reexamine women's approach to human rights and to let human rights be a priority in context of democratic reconstruction.
The model of our approach to women's human rights helped women to get rid of old symbiotic forms regarding male/ female relations determined by culture, religion, state and economic structure, but it also made us different from other groups.
By providing unique creative space for women's empowerment and advocacy in area of education, social rights, security, peace and gender equality, «Žene Ženama» members built an approach that preserves coherency of women's human rights and women's solidarity in BiH.
At the beginning, women establishers of «Žene Ženama» had different motives. Some of them wanted a safe space for articulation of war and post- war experiences; others wished for a creative space in which they will reexamine their knowledge through feminist theory and practice and plan actions in order to make changes in BiH society in area of human rights and male/ female relations.
Methodology and working principles
• Team work
• Feminist approaches in definition of goals and values of the organization
• Good information exchange
• Respect of diversities
• Good communication
• Motivation and voluntarism
• Partnership and solidarity
• Transparency of work and actions
The mission of the organization is a guideline for everyone whose social needs can be satisfied through the organization’s work. It determines the organization’s position in the society.
The mission is everlasting and came as a result of common work on definition of goals, values and future of the organization.