Integrationswerkstatt Unkel

The Integrationswerkstatt is an effort of integration, increased economic opportunity for refugees, and combatting prejudices and radicalism in both refugee and local German communities. Refugees have an ownership and management stake in the project equal to their German neighbors, and the project provides a sustainable civil-society-led integration model for other difficult locations. In the inevitable event of a new influx of refugees (for example, when Turkey opens their western border and allows up to 3 million new refugees to enter the European Union), these integrated refugees will be the role models and integrators for the new refugees.

The project is not simply for refugees. Integration is a two-way street, and cannot be achieved without the work of the local population. The citizens of Unkel has in the Integrationswerkstatt the opportunity to learn, for example, to repair their own bikes in the bicycle self-repair workshop from which the project takes its name, or to grow their own food in the community garden, to find a new book and enjoy a coffee or tea in the intercultural library and tea garden, to worship together with their new neighbors in the non-denominational prayer space, and to get to know their new neighbors in each of these project elements.

- #RefugeesWelcome and other vocal support is not enough without concrete action.
- Providing refugees with charity is not enough.
- Activities aimed at ensuring that Germans support refugees are not enough.
- Activities aimed at ensuring that refugees respect German culture and laws are not enough.
- Community and friendship are the goals of integration, and are the keys to a secure, prosperous future for refugees and for Europe.

Integration is work, and the work of building intercultural friendship and community is what the Integrationswerkstatt project is all about.