History of the Civil Society
 

It is whole when there is EVERYTHING and Living Heritage
 
In the column "History of the Civil Society" we will present events, beginnings of initiatives, programmes and bigger projects, "landmarks" of the civic movement that occurred in the ongoing month, as well as in previous years, not only in Macedonia, but also in the world. We invite you to send us information on such events at our address: MCIC "Nikola Parapunov" bb, 1000 Skopje, or at our e-mail address: mcms@mcms.org.mk. In both cases state "For The Civic World". This time, we present two very important events in the civil society in Macedonia:

 

IT IS WHOLЕ WHEN THERE IS ALL
Let us return to the forgotten values
 

On 24 May 1999, the videos from the first phase of the campaign "It is whole when there is everything", implemented by the MCIC, began to be broadcasted, and on 28 May, the same year, there was a promotion of this campaign at the "Colloseum" discotheque in Skopje.

The goal of this campaign was to promote the forgotten and suppressed values that characterised Macedonian citizens: the good relations between neighbours, the tolerance, the multiculturalism, the coexistence. The campaign consisted of several segments, among which, the involvement of children as a symbol of our future, with their opinions on the questions what is one, two and a whole. One of their responses was: "It is whole when there is everything" and this was selected to be the campaign's name.

 

Living Heritage Programme  
 

The implementation of the programme "Living Heritage", initiated by the Belgian foundation King Boduen, began in May 2002. Macedonia was the first country in the region of South-Eastern Europe which began to implement this programme (it was followed by Bulgaria, Romania and Bosnia and Herzegovina). Equal partner (from organizational and financial aspect) of the King Boduen Foundation in Macedonia is the Open Society Institute - Macedonia Foundation. The goal of this programme is to encourage the development of small communities (up to 25000 inhabitants) through recognizing their cultural values and using them as development resources. By now, through the Living Heritage Programme, 19 projects have been supported.