Austria

Association for the promotion of holistic perspectives on societal issues.

SINCE WHEN?

December 2007

WHY?

We believe in working with and for people to foster a change for building a sociocratic society.

FOR WHOM?

All interesed in working with and for people, to foster social cohesion and mutual undertstanding of social groups. The association coobra is based in Vienna. Our activities range over the entire country, as well as partnership project implementations in Europe and outside Europe. It pursues exclusively charitable purposes within the meaning of the federal fiscal code.

WHAT?

coobra which acts as a non-profit association aims the development, planning, implementation and communication of activities/projects in the areas of youth, work, culture, art, education, agriculture, democracy, media, health, migration and research, and other socially relevant areas.

We do offer adult edcucation, concept development, project management and research work.

BY WHOM?

The team consits of 2 to 3 persons running projects on voluntary level, coobra has no employees and works with experts and practicioners from different backgrounds on honorary level. Coobra cas a board of 4 people.

WHY “WORDS CONNECTING GENERATIONS”?

After having implemented Herklotzgasse21 and its sub-projects as

• research

• exhibition

• publication

• audio guide

• memorial

we decided to work futher on in the topic of oral history and want to share experiences and knowledge about other projects and approaches. The area of Lower Silesia and countries and partners involved in the project will provide a rich and fertile soil for further ideas that may be born during the project and will give for sure the opportunity to learn and exchange. Coobra supports the idea of new projects, connections and working relations on international level. We are interesed in learning and exchanging practices in the field of oral history, providing a substantiated basis for new common projects with trustful partners.

Country: Austria
Region: Vienna (district 15, Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus)
Town / city: Vienna,
Website: www.herklotzgasse21.at
Number Inhabitants: Vienna: 1.7 Mil. Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus: 72.000

Strenghts, potential and opportunities:
Referring to the 15th district only, as Vienna is a huge city, does face the chgallenges of middle European cities and still ranges under the top most livable cities in the world.

Inhabitants of the district:
Population structure today:
The age structure of the district population in 2001 was slightly younger than the average across Vienna. The number of children under 15 years was 15.3%, slightly higher than for Vienna city-wide (14.7%). The proportion of the population from 15 to 59 years stood at 65.8% (Vienna: 63.6%), with the proportion of people over the age of 60 as 19.0% (Vienna: 21.7%), significantly lower than the whole city. The gender distribution was in the district area at 48.2% men and 51.8% women.The number of married people had a share of 40.6%, compared with city-wide at 41.2%, slightly below the average of Vienna.
Origin and language of the inhabitants of Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus:
The proportion of foreign district residents in 2006 was 31.8% (all over Vienna: 19.1%) and was the highest value of a district of Vienna. As in the entire state, the percentage growth to 2001, he worked for 29.2%. The highest proportion of foreigners in 2005 represented approximately 9.6% share of the district population as nationals from Serbia and Montenegro. Another 4.7% were Turkish, 2.5% Polish, 2.3% Croatioan, 2.2% Bosnian and 1.1% Gernman 2001, nearly 35.2% of the district population was born in Austria. Almost 13.0% stated as a language Serbian, 8.7% Turkish and 5.4% Croatian.

Strenghts: the diversity of the population, the languages spoken, the high number of schools and educational offers, the very well developed public transportation system and the accessability of areas, a wide range of shopping facilities and still a high number of small corner shops, public social welfare organisation and a lot of civil society organisations
Potential: the inhabitants, free space, history that can be worked on, initiatives on public and private level the project can co-operate with

Opportunities: to work on a common identidy of the district as a livable and lovable area - and way more. A lot of young families who move there to find a
Challanges: Its multicultural and multiethnical background is seen as challenge as well a huge opportunity. The distict is still one of the youngest by inhabitants and hosts a lot of schools as well as a wide range of education offers for different target groups.
The district geographically is devided by a train line, that has its rail head in the district. „Herklotzgasse 21“ is situated in the south part and is also more actively involved there.

Potential of working with the oral history topic:

The local partners were the city district parliament and the local city district office. We cooperated with all local initiatives working with elederly people including retirement homes.
A very important partner are schools of all kinds in the area of Herklotzgasse 21, who were interested in the topic of oral history and were eager to co-operate with the project.

Local groups of denomination (Muslims, Christs, Jews, Hindi, Bhuddist) were invited and took part in the project.
Local neighbours were invited and took an active part in the project, - no matter the age or profession.

Co-operation with a lot of associations working in the field of history/oral history and rememberance projects in Vienna and the region.
The Jewish community and its major organisations in Vienna as partner and supporter of the projects idea.

Deeply grown relations ships to the people who told us their biographies, and who are the core heart of „herklotzgasse21“.
Info to the district: https://www.wien.gv.at/bezirke/rudolfsheim-fuenfhaus/