Protected: INCLUDE
INCLUDE | Inclusive Communities, Leadership, Understanding, Diversity & Equity.
INCLUDE is a three-year programme that seeks to address the growing challenges of racist violence, hate crime, intimidation, misinformation and community division across Northern Ireland.
The programme has been developed in response to increasing concerns about racial tensions and social cohesion, and is grounded in evidence, community consultation and CFNI’s experience supporting peacebuilding, reconciliation and community development.
INCLUDE is a grassroots, capacity-building programme designed for VCSE (Voluntary, Community, and Social Enterprise) organisations. The programme aims to foster social change, strengthen community relations, and combat race hatred in all its forms. Through comprehensive training, critical engagement, and storytelling, the programme equips community leaders and organisations to lead with confidence, truth, and unity whilst challenging the underlying causes of hatred and advocating for policy change.
Recognising that sustainable change requires both community action and systems change, the programme combines grassroots capacity-building with advocacy and policy influence. Learning and lived experience gathered through the programme will inform policy papers, campaigns and stakeholder engagement, ensuring that community voices help shape public policy and practice.
Programme Activities
The programme will deliver a range of interconnected activities designed to strengthen community resilience and prevent hate and division under following headings:
Building Leadership and Community Capacity
Supporting grassroots leaders, youth workers and representatives from minoritised communities through leadership development, trauma-informed practice, conflict mediation, peer learning and the creation of local Champions for Change networks.
Tackling Misinformation and Harmful Narratives
Delivering media literacy and disinformation awareness training that equips participants to recognise misinformation, conspiracy theories, media bias and online hate, helping communities respond effectively to emerging risks.
Storytelling and Narrative Change
Supporting creative and community-led initiatives including exhibitions, podcasts, storytelling projects and digital content that celebrate diversity, amplify underrepresented voices and challenge stereotypes.
Cross-Sector Collaboration
Convening community organisations, statutory agencies, local councils, funders and other stakeholders through roundtables, learning events and networking opportunities to improve coordination and collective action.
Advocacy and Policy Influence
Supporting community-led advocacy campaigns and producing evidence-based policy papers on issues such as hate crime prevention, race equality, digital rights and human rights, ensuring that lived experience informs decision-making.
Each programme strand is supported by a range of activities tailored to its focus. These include leadership and mediation training, media literacy workshops, storytelling and digital content projects, cross-sector networking and learning events, and advocacy support to help communities influence policy and practice.
Useful Resources An Evidence-Based, Community-Led Response
This programme has been developed following the Building Solidarity Conference in January 2025 organised by the Community Foundation for Northern Ireland, NICVA, Social Change Initiative and Africa House. This event was held at a critical moment, following a series of violent attacks in the summer of 2024 that left deep scars on local communities. The conference provided a platform for examining the root causes of such violence-specifically xenophobia, racism, and Islamophobia-and for building a collective response to these challenges. The full report can be viewed here: Building-Solidarity-Report.
A clear message emerged from the conference: lasting change requires investment in grassroots leadership, community resilience and collaboration, rather than relying solely on reactive or enforcement-led responses.
This was reinforced by research we commissioned More in Common to do ‘From Crisis to Action’, which highlighted the need for preventative, community-led approaches that strengthen local capacity, address misinformation and challenge harmful narratives before tensions escalate into conflict. Together, these findings shaped a programme that focuses on empowering communities to become active agents of change.
Our programme was further reinforced by insights from our Equity in Action programme that provided over £200k of support to 39 organisations across NI in innovative, community-led initiatives that directly addresses prejudice, helped to build digital resilience and foster solidarity across diverse communities.
Finally, and most importantly, our programme was also shaped and informed by practitioners and experts by experience. Experts by experience will continue to shape and inform the programme as it rolls out through co-design processes, lived-experience representation and a dedicated steering group. We want to ensure that those most affected by racism, exclusion and discrimination will play a leading role in shaping priorities, activities and solutions.
An Evidence-Based, Community-Led Response
This programme has been developed following the Building Solidarity Conference in January 2025 organised by the Community Foundation for Northern Ireland, NICVA, Social Change Initiative and Africa House. This event was held at a critical moment, following a series of violent attacks in the summer of 2024 that left deep scars on local communities. The conference provided a platform for examining the root causes of such violence-specifically xenophobia, racism, and Islamophobia-and for building a collective response to these challenges. The full report can be viewed here: Building-Solidarity-Report.
A clear message emerged from the conference: lasting change requires investment in grassroots leadership, community resilience and collaboration, rather than relying solely on reactive or enforcement-led responses.
This was reinforced by research we commissioned More in Common to do ‘From Crisis to Action’, which highlighted the need for preventative, community-led approaches that strengthen local capacity, address misinformation and challenge harmful narratives before tensions escalate into conflict. Together, these findings shaped a programme that focuses on empowering communities to become active agents of change.
Our programme was further reinforced by insights from our Equity in Action programme that provided over £200k of support to 39 organisations across NI in innovative, community-led initiatives that directly addresses prejudice, helped to build digital resilience and foster solidarity across diverse communities.
Finally, and most importantly, our programme was also shaped and informed by practitioners and experts by experience. Experts by experience will continue to shape and inform the programme as it rolls out through co-design processes, lived-experience representation and a dedicated steering group. We want to ensure that those most affected by racism, exclusion and discrimination will play a leading role in shaping priorities, activities and solutions.
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