Consultancy for Research on Countering Hate Speech Initiatives in Europe, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz International Centre for Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue(KAICIID), Vienna, Austria. Deadline: May 4, 2021.
KAICIID’s Europe Region Programme started in 2021 a Social Cohesion Initiative, which includes a pillar on Countering Hate Speech (CHS). This CHS project acknowledges that hate speech is becoming an increasingly serious problem in Europe with serious consequences for well-being, intergroup trust, integration and democracy. It also focusses on the important role which religious leaders continue to play in creating and implementing the initiatives and frameworks which stop hate speech and promote respectful dialogue, outreach, trust and community resilience. The project’s aim will be to draw upon the existing expertise and resources available, as well as the needs and priorities of religious leaders, and create training materials which will empower religious leaders to counter hate speech even better.
A crucial part of this process is mapping and analysing the many existing initiatives to counter hate speech, with an emphasis on those which engage religious leaders, which are currently taking place in Europe at national to international level. The point is to identify the strengths and weaknesses of initiatives in this field from the perspective of the organizations and of the religious leaders who both implement some of them and observe the results, and to identify the most pressing calls and recommendations for future action. This research will inform KAICIID’s outreach to potential partners and ensure the relevance of its programmatic work.
The Consultant will carry out desk research in order to create an analytical report on the status of countering hate speech initiatives in Europe. It will map and discuss the most important initiatives and resources to counter hate speech of the last five years across four regions of Europe (Norther, Eastern, Western and Southern Europe) as well as the nature of their involvement of religion and religious actors. It will consider which initiatives have shaped public policy on this topic and how they have (or have not) managed to do so. It will analyze the initiatives’ successes from the perspectives of their organizations, including a number of religious institutions, and explore the strengths, weaknesses of these initiatives.
Center for Intercultural Dialogue 