Norwegian People´s Aid

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is the labour movement’s humani-tarian organisation for solidarity.Solidarity is built upon mutualsupport between different forcesfighting for the same goals. Solidaritymeans supporting groups so thatthey themselves may have theopportunity to protect and promotetheir own interests. Solidarity is theopposite of charity. Whilst charityimplies that the giver has controlover the recipient, solidarity meansshowing respect for the partners’integrity and their right to set theirown conditions.

Human worth means the same rightsfor everyone – regardless of sex,ethnic origin, religion, age or socialstatus. Solidarity and human worthhave always been fundamental forNorwegian People’s Aid (NPA). Atboth the national and internationallevel, NPA works actively to realisethe vision of improving individuals’living conditions and contributingto a more just society.

Despite a certain amount of demo-cratisation in a number of countries,the distance between peoples andtheir rulers is growing in large partsof the world. For NPA, popular parti-cipation and organisation are there-fore important measures for promot-ing and securing peoples’ rights. Ourgoal of a more just world means thatwe must often choose partners thatare in conflict with their rulers.

We support people in their strugglefor more power and greater influenceover their own lives and social deve-lopment. Norwegian People’s Aid willtake up a clear position on relevantsocial questions through publicdebate.

Guidelinesfor NPA´s work

olidarity

Norwegian People’s Aid is a membership-governed organisation which stands onfour pillars of equal worth – youth work,health and rescue work, socially targetedwork and international work. NPA basesmuch of its activity on members’ volun-tary work.

In NPA’s national, international, youthand health and rescue work, the followingareas shall be promoted:

• The fight against oppression, poverty and unjust distribution• The fight against racism and discrimination• Work for equality and against violence and injustice• Prevention, voluntary engagement and competence building.

NPA is to be an allied support player andmouthpiece for our partners and theirorganisations.

Norwegian Society

S

The fight against poverty means taking sideswithout compromise with the poor and outcastand putting into action initiatives whichsystematically contribute to long-termimprovements in their living conditionsand basic requirements.

In its home-based work, NPA will build upon thesame principles as lie behind its internationalsolidarity work: efforts are to be aimed atchanging prevailing conditions for the poor andsocially excluded so that they may have a betterlife on a permanent basis. This means thatsupport initiatives must be shaped in such away across the country that the individual is putin the best possible position to control and takeresponsibility for his/her own life.

Uniform business life and the flagging out ofcorner-stone industries make it difficult tomaintain settlement in outlying Norwegiandistricts, but the greatest differences in livingconditions in Norway are to be found in thelarger towns. Both the richest and the poorest

Norwegian People’s Aid is to be active in the fight againstsocial difference, social exclusion, poverty and human need

in our own country too.

people in the country live in Oslo. Poverty,social exclusion and poor living conditions arebound to a number of conditions that occursimultaneously to a great extent, therebyreinforcing each other. Unemployment hasmore powerful social consequences today thanpreviously. Unemployment, low social statusand little education often appear together withpoor health and diet. Poverty often leads tosocial exclusion and loneliness. Environmentalstrains connected with noise, pollution andother population density problems occur mostfrequently where living conditions are poor frombefore. The sum of these factors reinforcesexisting differences in Forskjells-Norge. (Termcoined to describe the existence of growingdifferences in living conditions and treatmentbetween social groups in Norway, as opposedto the relative similarity of such groups earlier;literally the Norway of Differences – translator’sremark.)

Over the last 30 years, Norway has graduallybecome a more multi-cultural and multi-facetedsociety, but people with different ethnic back-grounds come off worse in terms of both jobsand housing. The majority by far of immigrants

Solidarity

functions well in Norwegian society and hasmade considerable contributions to thecountry’s economy and culture.

The stream of refugees from the poor world tothe rich is increasing. Many people in a numberof continents still experience persecution, war,conflict and injustice against themselves andthose close to them. A small number of refu-gees also find their way to Norway, and NPA willcontinue to be strongly engaged in the work forrefugees’ living conditions and rights.

The altered composition of the Norwegianpopulation has given rise to racism and xeno-phobia. NPA will therefore take the fight againstracism and discrimination further – in order todevelop greater mutual respect and commercebetween the different ethnic groups who nowlive in this country. To recruit members amongimmigrants and refugees is a set objective.

Compared with the situation of the worldat large, conditions in our own country areextremely good, but here too the differencesare increasing between poor and rich. Frombeing able to ensure welfare for all, we havenow got a society where the market has takenover many of the welfare state’s previoustasks. An increasing number of players areoffering private solutions to meet people’sneeds and to increase their life quality.

A majority in Parliament has given the go-aheadto expose services that were previously apublic responsibility to competition, and isarranging conditions for this to an ever-increasing extent. The Norwegian welfare

state is in a crisis of confidence and is facingan uncertain future. It is a challenge for NPAto weigh up the role we are to play in this greyarea. We think health and social services area public responsibility. In the last few years,however, needs have arisen for which the publicsector has no established provision. NPA willcontinue to help groups who fall outside publicprovision.

Norwegian People’s Aid assumes that thepolitical authorities will continue to have theresponsibility for creating egalitarian livingconditions for all in Norway. We will applyconstant pressure on the authorities so thatthey follow up on this responsibility. In addition,we will set up activities for the evening out ofliving conditions and for the fight againstpoverty and social exclusion.

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Make space for youth!

S

Youth is more open to new ideas, has more creativity and thinksdifferently from the adult generation. Impatient young people

are often the driving force behind social change.

NPA is also an organisation for youth, and istherefore to work actively in recruiting youngpeople from different environments and fromdifferent ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Theorganisation is to contribute to increased socialengagement and a positive, drug-free youthculture with a varied range of activitiesemphasising value questions, attitude work,health and rescue and development work.

NPA takes political stands which may becontroversial. Today, this is one of ourcharacteristics. Youth is to be challenged totake a standpoint and develop itself by meansof activity and debate. Youth must be given roomto contribute to change in the organisation.

Youth activity in NPA is to develop interest andunderstanding for active value-choices andsolidarity work. It is an objective to participatein and strengthen national and internationalyouth networks with the same fundamentalvalues and visions as our own. NPA will workfor youth to get better opportunities to influ-ence its own conditions and its own future.

Health, rescue and accidentprevention work

Solidarity

NPA’s Health and Rescue Service is to influ-ence the public sector towards better overallpreparedness in Norway and will continue to bean important player within the rescue service inNorway. This demands a high professional levelin terms of the organisation’s leaders, instruc-tors and crews. It is therefore important toquality control our training and to suit it to ourrole in the rescue service. In collaboration withothers, NPA’s Health and Rescue Service is towork to maintain the central place of voluntaryorganisations in the Norwegian rescue service.Systematic, realistic, continuous, locally basedpreparedness work is to form the foundation forour work in the rescue service.

Work to do with first aid has a long traditionin the organisation and will continue to holda prominent position. NPA’s Health and RescueService is to be a central contributor to first aid

Health, rescue, preparedness and accident prevention work arecentral tasks for NPA’s voluntary groups. In many municipalities

we can say with pride that NPA’s Health and Rescue Serviceis the organisation’s outward face.

training in Norway. The knowledge and skills ofNPA’s Health and Rescue Service may be madeuse of in our international work where this isrelevant.

We must be open for new health related tasksin keeping with social development. We carryout accident prevention work by means ofcourses and campaigns – for example, heartand lung rescue, work for the prevention ofdrowning, traffic safety, first aid courses,health, rescue and catastrophe preparednessin Norway.

It is one of NPA’s objectives to teach as manypeople as possible life-saving first aid. Bymeans of attitude-shaping campaigns, we willclosely collaborate with the labour movementin our accident prevention work.

International society

S

Today many of these new democracies areexperiencing a relapse towards authoritariangovernment, armed conflict and increasedsocial and economic tensions.

Globalisation implies an increased concen-tration of power into fewer hands. However,globalisation also implies that both individualsand organisations have got far greater oppor-tunities for mutual contact. The challenge ofglobalisation is to shape rules and more demo-cratic institutions that can give stronger leader-ship – locally, nationally, regionally and globally.

Sustainable development presupposesincreased democratic control of naturalresources, sound global agreements and thepossibility of local administration. NorwegianPeople’s Aid therefore supports our partnerorganisations in their fight for the increasedright to decide over their own resources.Resource administration should be in balancewith the sustainability of nature.

Africa is the world’s poorest continent but thegreatest differences in income are to be foundin Latin America. Today free-market liberalismholds economic sway over the whole world.Free-market liberalism encourages social andeconomic differences, leads to bias in the

In the 1980s and 90s, the world saw a wave of democratisationsweep over former Eastern Europe and many poor countries.

distribution of power and influence and a moredifficult life for the majority of the people. Inpoor countries, an increasing problem is thatvery many people are leaving their villages andmoving to an even more difficult life withoutwork in the big cities. Every day, more than amillion people move from the countryside to thebig cities: a major process of urbanisation thatNPA must take into greater consideration.

Many of the world’s wars and conflicts areowing to a lack of political, economic, socialand cultural rights. When people lose hopeand the basis for making a living, unrest andpolitical instability arise. The right to food,water, housing, health and education arefundamental human rights. A characteristic ofNPA’s choice of partners and countries in whichwe operate is support to the oppressed in asituation of conflict. During battles for libera-tion, civil war, social and political conflicts, wehave supported powers that promote socialjustice and democratisation. After liberation,NPA will continue its support for increasedpopular participation and greater social justice.

Norwegian People’s Aid has chosen to developits international cooperation in two major ways:firstly, support to liberation movements andgroups fighting for political and social justice;

Solidarity

secondly, support for the development ofsociety on the local level in close cooperationwith local popular organisations so that theycan themselves gain control over their owndevelopment – it is their programmes andprojects and their voice which should bedecisive. Our role is to be arranger, advisorand network builder.

The supporting pillar of Norwegian People’sAid’s international work is long-term develop-ment cooperation. NPA is not an emergencyaid organisation, but crisis contributions maybe put into areas where we already havea presence.

Organisation building is a method of promotingpopular participation and strengthening thedevelopment of democracies. By democracywe mean a society based on freedom andconsultation with the opportunity of influencingone’s own situation by means of participation.Democracy assumes respect for human rightsand equality between women and men.

Landmines affect innocent civilians and area great obstacle to all social development.Refugees cannot return home, cultivable land islying fallow and the way to school is dangerous.Norwegian People’s Aid has developed compre-hensive skills in clearance of land mines andattaches great importance to the transfer ofthese skills into local hands. Together withmany other players, we carry out politicalactivity for increased support of the Land MineConvention of 1999, which regulates theinternational ban on production, storage, saleand use of anti-personnel mines. Mine

clearance and mine awareness are precon-ditions for a country to be able to get on itsfeet again after a war.

The AIDS epidemic is a global catastrophewhich is threatening to wipe out wholesocieties. AIDS has the most serious conse-quences for poor people because the poorsection of a population has less access toinformation, medicines and treatment.In addition, they are also prone to under-nourishment and malnutrition – factors whichcontribute towards a poor immune system.International society has a great responsibilityfor the effective combat of hiv/aids. NPA isto integrate the fight against hiv/aids in allprojects.

War and violence are never a solution toinjustice and conflict. Lasting peace is createdonly by solving conflicts through dialoguebetween groups and countries that standopposed to one another. All nations must giveactive support to the UN – so that the UN’sauthority as an international conflict-solver andpeacemaker can be restored. This demandsthat the great powers respect the UN and con-tribute financially. Norwegian People’s Aid is toinfluence the Norwegian authorities to work forthis objective and will also work for the samegoal through international networks.

SP.O.B. 8844 YoungstorgetN–0028 OSLO, NORWAY

Phone +47 22 03 77 00Fax +47 22 20 08 70

Internet: www.npaid.orgE-mail: npaid@npaid.org

Principlesand value basisfor Norwegian People´s Aid

Gra

phic

des

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Res

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s AS

- Pr

inte

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: K

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Principlesand value basisfor Norwegian People´s Aid

Adopted by NPA´s General Assembly 22.06.03

Solidarity