đ SIETAR France – SIETAR Polska – SIETAR Europa Direct Members Joint Online Event: « Intercultural Competence and Intercultural Dialogue in Troubled Times »
đ March 19, 2026 | đ» 9 am -19:30
Online | Free & open to all National SIETAR members
In a world marked by wars, uncertainty, and deep political polarization, intercultural competence is more essential than ever. How can we, as interculturalists, foster dialogue and mutual understanding when divisions and mistrust prevail?
How can brain science and quantum leadership help us ? How can we use intercultural dialogue to challenge political narratives we see as divisive or dangerous ? Can we decolonise our approaches and how ? How can we use alternative tools like street art and storytelling to create safe-spaces to foster exchanges about divisive topics and foster peace and understanding within our communities ? And can we « bridge divides » at all when individuals are in a war zone ?
These are some of the topics we will explore. Please find the first draft of the program below:
Join this collaborative online event co-hosted and co-organised by SIETAR France, SIETAR Polska, and SIETAR Europa Direct Members representatives, Grazia Ghellini, Cynthia Milani and Lidia Wisniewska Together weâll explore the transformative role of interculturality in creating spaces for empathy, trust, and dialogue. Short talks and discussions, presentations and Q&As, Workshops and game sessions will feature diverse voices from across the SIETAR community – offering insights, practices, and inspiration for peace building through intercultural engagement.
âš To conclude, participants are invited to a friendly virtual mixer in breakout rooms – an opportunity to connect, share reflections, and renew our community ties across borders.
Letâs come together to listen, exchange, and strengthen the bridges that connect us all.
9:00 -10:00 CET Opening and Iris Wenck,« Intercultural Competence as Experiential Value: Destabilization, Perspective Change, and Professional Reorientation »
Intercultural competence is often conceptualized as a set of knowledge, attitudes, and skills that can be acquired and mastered. This contribution instead approaches intercultural competence primarily as an experiential value that emerges through concrete intercultural encounters – encounters that challenge established assumptions, certainties, and professional
routines rather than confirming them. The central argument is that experience opens up new perspectives precisely because it destabilizes what previously appeared self-evident.
Theoretically, the paper draws on the doctoral research of Regina Hauser, who conceptualizes intercultural competence not as a static qualification but as a dynamic, biographically embedded process. This perspective is complemented by JĂŒrgen Habermasâ understanding of cultural identity as dialogical and relational, constituted through processes of mutual recognition. From this viewpoint, intercultural competence is not something one possesses but something that is continuously negotiated in interaction.
Building on this framework, the contribution reflects on the authorâs own professional experiences in intercultural contexts, illustrating how a formerly knowledge-based and seemingly âsecureâ approach to intercultural training gradually shifted. Experiences of irritation, misunderstanding, and uncertainty led to a reorientation away from the transmissionof cultural explanations toward more experiential, reflexive, and power-sensitive training formats.
The paper argues for understanding intercultural competence as an open-ended learning process in which uncertainty plays a productive role. In doing so, it contributes to current critical debates on competence-oriented approaches and invites discussion on what intercultural competence can – and cannot – be today.
10:00-11:00 CET
Cynthia Milani, « Quantum Leadership, NEUROScience, and Dialogue in a Polarized World: Tips & Tools for InterculturalistsâŠâŠÂ »
In todayâs world of war, uncertainty with political polarization, dialogue across cultural and ideological differences is becoming increasingly difficult. In this session, Cynthia Milani – interculturalist, Harvard-certified mediator, neuroleadersip coach, and author of Quantum Leadership: A NEUROanthropologistâs Guide to Shaping the Future explores how insights from brain science, intercultural practice, and quantum leadership can help us understand why difficult conversations often turn into conflict in a non-binary, complex, hyper-connected world. We will look at how the brain responds to threat and difference. Participants will discuss practical ways to create safer spaces for dialogue, challenge divisive narratives. We will learn how to use tools from neuroscience that encourage empathy, understanding, and peace building across cultures. Because peace is not just a right – it is our job.
11:00: Coffee break
Jonathan Levy « Democracy begins with childrenâs rights »
“As an educationalist, my work has been centred on children. This has taught me that the key issues with which the world is grappling come back to universal values of humanity. These issues include injustice, corruption, undemocratic processes, lack of trust and integrity, conflict and power struggles, racism, cultural intolerance and discrimination. They are important, but they are the symptoms of something deeper, which touches on our relationship to our fellow humans. Participation is the building block of democracy. It creates active citizens and thriving civil societies. It can hold governments to account and challenge corruption and undemocratic practices. Where do we teach people that their input is a valuable resource? During our formative years, we build our understanding of society, first in the family, then at school and through recreational opportunities and our encounters with health centres and social welfare. We learn from our eldersâ behaviour. We observe whether we are respected or humiliated, whether we are protected, under-protected or over-protected, whether our opinions are taken seriously. We see whether we are enabled to find our unique place in democracy, whether we are thought of as true competent partners. These elements will determine our way of understanding our world and its complexities. They will decide whether we acquire a critical consciousness which allows us to make informed decisions so as to transform ourselves and our society for the better. Participation empowers children in their diverse situations to make decisions about the primary issues that affect their lives (growing, learning, loving) and the lives of others and the environment. It is essential for children and young people to develop their own capacities and skills to participate fully in their communities and society.
This questions whether we see Intercultural pedagogy as learning competences or as a set of values is it science or an ideology.
12:00-13:00 Hendrik Nobbe Workshop – “The Trusted Advisor: A human focus”Â
At a time when many conversations quickly turn into debates and mistrust seems to be growing, the ability to truly listen and build trust across differences has become increasingly important.
Drawing on more than thirty years of international experience in sales, leadership, training, and coaching, Hendrik Nobbé has often found himself working across cultures, languages, and perspectives. Interestingly, he was frequently not the expert in the room.
What enabled collaboration was something more fundamental: listening, curiosity, and genuine interest in the other person. These elements closely relate to the concept of trust described in The Trusted Advisor (Maister, Green & Galford, 2000), where trust grows through credibility, reliability, intimacy, and low self-orientation.
This workshop invites participants to explore how trust and meaningful dialogue can be fostered in intercultural contexts.
13:30- 14:00 BREAK
14:00-15:00 Victoria Spashchenko
âWhen fostering no dialogue is the best you can doâ
In her contribution, Victoria challenges a sacred, longâheld assumption in our field that dialogue is always inherently good. She invites participants to consider a counterâargument: in certain contexts, intercultural dialogue is not only unhelpful but can be actively misused to erase responsibility, legitimise harmful actors, or provide reputational cover under the banner of âcultural exchange.â
This session presents a real case for participants to analyse and discuss, followed by the group exchanging reflections on the ethical frameworks essential for interculturalists. We will also explore why, in certain contexts, refusing a dialogue is the most responsible professional stance.
15:00-16:30
Dr. George F. Simons; CEO, diversophy and Confidence Happiness: « Recreating cultural narratives for tomorrow »
Facing the political and social threats to our understanding of culture and the practice of intercultural training and teaching is not only necessary for the survival of the profession but for human survival on the planet. Fear and conflict avoidance need to be replaced by courage and conflict resolution skills. Using the insights of neuroscience and social constructionism we have the ability to address the critical issues of todayâs world but require the strategies and brave collaboration to do so. This seminar will identify and bring to the floor todayâs critical cultural challenges of:
* Decolonizing the effects of historical and contemporary human exploitation and their role
in the definition and practice of intercultural competence.
* The current surge of dictatorship built upon the exploitation of usâversusâthem identity
narratives.
* Suppression of ecological issues in economic thinking and practice.
* Exploitation of religious values for sociopolitical ends.
* Human abuse in the form of contemporary slavery and gender exploitation.
* Feminist patriarchalism, the unconscious tendency to define and pursue womenâs success
in terms of a male capitalist system.
* Threats to the education, lives, and well-being of men and boys, due to the loss of role definition and toxic masculinity perspectives.
Brainstorming to identify other âuntouchableâ issues in the experience of participants and dealing with these perspectives involves recognizing the challenges in the creation and management of social constructed social metanarratives, and the strategies needed for awakening from the economic age to a cultural age as suggested by Paul Schafer. Introduction of these topics will be followed by small group discussion stimulated by questions taken from diversophy games dealing with these topics and a debrief aimed at identifying practical strategies for engaging these issues in our professional intercultural
16:30-17:00 break
17:00 pm -18:00 Claudia Schlosser and Iris Wenck « Digital Transformation as an Intercultural Challenge: Acquiring Intercultural Competence through the Digitalization of a Community-Based Organization »
After migration and inclusion, digitalization represents one of the most significant contemporary challenges for social and community-based organizationsâparticularly in contexts characterized by high linguistic and cultural diversity. This paper examines the acquisition of intercultural competence through the digital transformation of the MĂŒZe (Mothersâ and Family Center) in Bremen-Tenever, a social organization in which 26 different languages are currently spoken.
Starting from the assumption that digitalization is not merely a technical process but a profoundly intercultural negotiation, the contribution shows how digital transformation reshapes access to information, participation, and power relations within organizations.
Digital skills, linguistic resources, and cultural interpretations are deeply intertwined in this process.
The paper presents the MĂŒZe as a practice-based case study, describing the digitalization process step by step: from the initial situation to key challenges, including language barriers, heterogeneous digital experiences, mistrust toward digital tools, and institutional constraints. Particular attention is paid to the learning processes of staff members, who developed and reflected upon their own intercultural competencies throughout the transformation process.
The case study demonstrates that digitalization can function as a learning space for intercultural competence when designed in a participatory, reflexive, and context-sensitive manner. The contribution thus offers an empirically grounded perspective on intercultural competence in community organizations and argues that digital transformation not only requires intercultural competence but can actively foster its development.
18:00-19:30 Socialising /Bridging Mixer