The Next Generation of Turkish German Civil Society: New Paradigms, New Approaches

Date: March 2, 2015
Time: 14.00
Place:  santralistanbul Campus, Board of Trustees Meeting Room

Speaker: Filiz Bikmen (Richard von Weizsacker Fellow 2014, Robert Bosch Stiftung)

The seminar is organized by İstanbul Bilgi University Center for Migration Research.

Seminar will be held in English.

Contact: İstanbul Bilgi University Center for Migration Research
rc.mig@bilgi.edu.tr  /  0212 311 53 50

Abstract:
Migrant workers from Turkey to Germany, who decided not to return back to their home country, began to form informal and formal civil society associations in the 1980s and 1990s for social, cultural and religious purposes. As the issue of integration became an increasingly important issue, they began developing service delivery programs to support state funded programs assisting newcomers and existing Turkish communities in Germany. However, as new generations are born and raised in Germany, the form and function of civil society organizations are also shifting. The new generation –mainly second and third– are actively engaging on discourses related to equal opportunity, social justice, inclusion, active citizenship, and asset-based community development. They apply approaches and operational models which engage mainstream German CSOs as well as the Turkish German community and other intercultural community efforts. They are reaching outward to other communities and the broader society, and remaining objective when looking inward, examining their own communities’ traditions and practices and questioning the extent to which they serve to benefit current and future generations to come. 

Filiz Bikmen:
Filiz Bikmen, since 2002, has been working with foundations and NGOs in Turkey to promote social justice and philanthropy. Currently, she is a social investment and philanthropy advisor, working with individuals, families and institutional philanthropic organizations to create "Constellations for Change". She also serves as a Senior Program Officer for the EMpower Foundation in New York, and as the Vice Chairperson of the Interaction Institute for Social Change in Boston. Filiz Bikmen lectures regularly at universities and conferences in Turkey and abroad, serves on the faculty of the Harvard University Non Profit Management Certificate Program, and is author of several publications on subjects related to philanthropy and civil society. In 2014, Bikmen was awarded the Richard von Weizscaker Residential Fellowship at the Bosch Foundation in Berlin, where she conducted an action research study on the civil society activities of second and third generations of Turkish German NGO leaders. She holds an MA in Organizational Psychology from Columbia University and a dual BS degree in Psychology and Business Communications from SUNY Brockport.