Director Jakob Erle quoted in Danish newspaper, Politiken.dk, about Egyptian parliamentary elections

Article in Al Ahram Al Masaai on the political journalism workshop which took place at DEDI 14-15 November 2011.

One of the things that really caught my interest at the DEDI Dialogue Forum was unfolding the understanding of different words. It was the unfolding of our different interpretations and understanding of them.

The forum created a space where different keywords like leadership could be explored and discussed. The word had many different meanings even though it could be very straightforward.

One of the key discussions came when one of the Egyptians explained that the word leader had a very different meaning in their language. The discussion came in connection with the discussion that Egypt needed a new leader. As it turned about at the forum it seemed like that the Egyptians needed to redefine, create a common understanding or make a new word for ‘leader’. The word leader had too many bad associations.

This was interesting to experience, that creating a common understanding of the word leader, might be a step before finding a leader.

The forum and camp created a space where subjects, ideas, thoughts and opinions could be talked about to a much deeper level than normally. With the combination of diversity, passion, time and openness we reached new understandings and eye-openers, which sometimes moved us from a self created understanding to a common understanding.

This story was written by Morten Starup, a Danish participant, on his experience in joining the DEDI Dialogue Forum in Newiba city, Egypt.

It is always exciting and enlightening to meet colleagues from other countries. Still, the DEDI democracy seminar was something special. The Egyptian journalist colleagues whom we met showed an enormous will to cover the parliamentary elections in an impartial and incorruptible way. They were very curious to hear how political journalism and spin works in Denmark.

So even though we from the Danish group mainly came to explain and teach, we took with us as least as much. On top of that, the seminar was well organized and there was made space to spend a more informal time together across nationalities. Even if the seminar is over now, to me this is just the beginning of following closely Egypt’s efforts to develop into a democracy with an impartial and free press.

This article was written by Rasmus Nielsen, the Danish Editor-in-chief of the political online publication Altinget.dk about his experience in attending the Political Journalism Seminar organized by the Danish Egyptian Dialogue Institute last summer.