Why do people participate in an EDP?

There are as many different reasons for participation in an EDP as persons who have already participated in our EDPs. Here are some as inspiration:

Exposure and dialogue programmes can be like further training and, e.g., be aligned with sensibilisation and orientation of the participants for specific tasks in fighting poverty.

For politicians, knowledge about legal and political framework conditions, where self-help can be effective, may be more important.

EDPs may have an evaluation component. Various instruments of development cooperation cannot always be evaluated via a questionnaire or an interview. Specifically, continuous improvement and adjustments of instruments for fighting poverty can be reflected particularly well via an EDP.

Personalities from the banking or business sectors rather have the innovative potential and the entrepreneurial skills of the hosts at their focus.

For church representatives, the exposure and dialogue programmes may provide impulses for pastoral work and world-church learning.

EDPs have not only subject further training but also personality development at their focus. The intense contact with people who take a different point of view than oneself, as well as the time taken to give space to this meeting, not only expands one's own horizons but also reinforces the view of what is necessary in life.

EDPs can be a productive time-out. The central element is taking time to meet other people and to learn from them.

Exposure and dialogue programmes permit a deeper understanding of the living conditions and the potential of poor or marginalised people quickly – and also of the values that guide them. The personal experience and exchange with specialists and local decision-makers helps those responsible in politics to subject their knowledge and experience to a reality test and to expand their own horizons. In dialogue with the people on site, they gain new insights.

Participants discover cross-connections between complex situations that area relevant for political decisions. Participants thus strengthen their competence to develop appropriate concepts and instruments to fight poverty, for the regional development of the economy or the social design of globalisation.

Participants also profit from a programme that links important actors internationally and that permits development of strategic alliances. We strongly observe an interesting group structure from different areas when putting together the participants. These targets are also served by the composition of the participant groups in the individual programmes: Participants are always persons who cover as many subjects of experiences as possible, and equally distributed among women and men, specialists and personalities from political, civilian society and institutional areas.

In addition to the reasons named here, we have heard many other reasons throughout the years of our work because of which participation has paid off for professional as well as personal reasons.