Meanings that promote unity: how to talk about internally displaced persons in new communities

During the full-scale invasion, the number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) who fled the war and left their home regions to find refuge in other regions has rapidly increased. Effective integration of IDPs can become a new chapter in community life through the exchange of experience and familiarity with the culture of people from regions that may not have been known to community members before.

Significant work towards the effective integration of IDPs into the communities to which they have moved is being done by civil society organizations, including the Right to Protection Foundation. The foundation has been working with the problems of internally displaced persons since 2014 and studies the processes of integration into a new community. In addition, the Right to Protection cooperates with the media and provides journalists with information to cover IDPs.

1. Life, with the support of the “Right to Protection” Foundation, with the involvement of communication specialists, journalists and members of NGOs, decided to find out how to write and talk about IDPs’ problems accurately now, in order to convey the essence to the reader (viewer) without distorting the main ideas of the messages.

For almost 2 years of full-scale war, the main messages in the media have been changing – what worked at the beginning of the war and was subsequently updated in 2022 is no longer effective. The very essence of the messages is gradually losing relevance. This is due to the fact that the integration of IDPs goes through certain stages, and the audience gets used to it and needs new statements. This was emphasized by the Foundation’s program coordinator Natalia Proskurenko.

“After the full-scale invasion, the number of internally displaced persons increased significantly compared to the period since 2014. Therefore, at the beginning, it was extremely important to deliver messages that encouraged empathy, indifference, and called for help to IDPs. Today, most IDPs have already found shelter in new communities and their basic needs have been met. But they still face the challenge of integrating into society. Thus, messages about the benefits of IDPs for the community, about interaction with people and expanding horizons have become relevant. There is a fight against certain stereotypes about IDPs, discrimination and stigmatization. The messages have become deeper – about a person, their emotional and psychological state, their inclusion and the impact of displacement,” says Natalia Proskurenko.

The expert also emphasizes that the research conducted by the Foundation shows a change in the focus of messages – from general and comprehensive ones aimed at a wide reader (viewer).

“Each community has its own situation, its own challenges and opportunities. It is important to convey that the story of each internally displaced person is unique and has its own unique value for the host community. We should take into account that different regions and different communities may have their own specific situation.

Our research from last year shows that there are different types of conflicts: value, cultural, religious, economic and others. Some communities in the region may experience more frequent value and cultural conflicts, while others may experience them due to economic factors. Because of this, generalizations can be harmful to the perception in specific areas,” says Natalia Proskurenko.

She emphasizes that before conducting communication campaigns in the community, it is necessary to identify different audiences and choose the appropriate form of communication. The same applies to the channels of such communication – they should be selected according to the situation. And it is not always the information channel (resource).

“It seems that nowadays, specific local events involving both IDPs and representatives of host communities are more effective in promoting dialogue and understanding. These can be cultural and educational events, joint community improvement activities, volunteer initiatives, etc.”, says the expert.

Liubov Mykhailiuk, director of the charitable organization “Tree of My Life Charitable Foundation”, candidate for resource-oriented counselors and consultant in military psychology. She provides psychological support to IDPs, including those who have come and are coming to Zakarpattia since the beginning of the full-scale invasion. Ms. Lyubov confirms that the relationship between IDPs and communities is improving based on mutual motivation and action.

“We have very positive examples: some of the first IDPs who received psychological support from us were psychologists by profession, so they later became colleagues of our psychological and educational project and began to provide psychological support to those IDPs who arrived later. Later, they returned home. But even today, our team also has a colleague from Kharkiv.

Some of the displaced people are actively involved in the social life of the community, helping out at fairs where volunteers raise funds to buy drones, weave nets, and collect wax for trench candles. Those who have already found a job volunteer in their free time. For example, in the winter, they started knitting things for wounded soldiers with prostheses,” says Lyubov Mykhailyuk.

She adds that information in the media that will draw attention to the needs of internally displaced citizens should contain messages that focus more on the emotionally stable state of people and new urgent needs: employment, social protection, etc. Messages that will encourage local authorities to work on the next step in adaptation – motivating people to get involved in work, volunteering, and socially active community life.

“We see the following trend now: The remaining IDPs are mostly motivated to integrate into the local community. They want to change something in their lives, to work, to volunteer. Again, all this depends on how resilient a person is to the challenge and to the trauma that the full-scale invasion has caused,” says Lyubov Mykhailyuk.

The head of the charity organization emphasizes that she sees the need to create conditions for additional motivation of internally displaced citizens by the state and charitable organizations. This is necessary in order to support the efficiency and determination of IDPs who want to retrain, get a new job, and realize their potential in volunteer practices and other public initiatives.

What messages and media tools are currently helping to integrate IDPs into communities – experts’ opinion.

Successful messages

Based on research results

Maryna Hovorukhina agrees that the media messages related to internally displaced persons and those that worked to unite and support morale after February 24 have now lost their relevance.

“In 2022, there were still hopes that the war would not last long and, of course, general messages – often positive – were well received and the target audience responded well to them. But here we need to distinguish messages from slogans.

For example, “Everything will be Ukraine” is a slogan. But messages in communication should contain information that answers the question: what do I want people to do and what will they get for it? For example, if we formulate a message with the task of better integrating and engaging internally displaced people in communities, we need to understand what prevents them from integrating properly, what are the problems and what we need to communicate about,” emphasizes Maryna Hovorukhina.

She confirms that effective messages should now respond to the needs of specific communities, be localized and understandable to the target audience.

“It is necessary to investigate what are the current challenges in different communities, what are the current opinions of the population on a particular issue (for example, the problems of IDP integration)? If we assume that there is a hypothesis that integration is going well, what should we do next? But this hypothesis should be based on a study of the target audience. Only when we conduct a study of the target audience in the community do we understand: “Yeah, people are thinking about this now. Now they have false stereotypes about it.” And the task of our communication is to solve this, refute false narratives or even create new positive ones,” says the expert.

She emphasizes that such research is the task of local authorities, who need to understand the current situation with certain problems and how to control it. Such research, in particular, is helped by international foundations, which, according to Maryna Hovorukhina, are very interested in local governments and communities addressing them with quality projects and requests.

“Here I also have a big question for local authorities and NGOs, which should also help journalists work with these messages, formulate them, find stories, because they are on the ground and understand the context. So their task is to help journalists cover the topic in a way that shows hope in the end.

And I would say that the initiative should come from local authorities and public organizations. And I would strongly recommend that they improve their communication skills. Because while these channels are already well developed in Kyiv and in big cities, there is a lot of room for work and very cool communication projects at the community level,” says Maryna Hovorukhina.

Messages in large publications

Regarding the messages and forms of coverage of IDP integration issues aimed at a wide audience, such as readers of all-Ukrainian news portals, the expert notes the need to work with “hopeful materials.”

“That is, when you don’t have a victim in the story, but a hero or heroine. When you are not against something, for example, against discrimination against internally displaced people, but for something. For example, “we are for these people to integrate as soon as possible.” And the search for solutions and so on. And positive examples are necessary: what will happen if people successfully integrate,” explains Maryna Hovorukhina.

She emphasizes that the best way to convey information about internally displaced persons is through stories in which people recognize themselves, their relatives and friends.

Storytelling

Andriy Kulykov shares the opinion that people’s personal stories are the best way to draw attention to the integration of internally displaced people and the range of problems associated with it.

“I think that it is not theses and slogans that need to be formulated, but stories. It can be a story of success, a story of hardship and, ultimately, success. A human story will attract attention and show how similar we can be in our experiences. And any story about how, relatively speaking, when IDPs come to western Ukraine, they learn new things, enrich themselves culturally, and, accordingly, bring their valuable things to the communities where they find themselves. Suddenly, a lot of people are faced with the need to find a common language with those with whom they had not had it before. And I think this is a very big asset for us,” says Andriy Kulykov.

He reminds us that the process of IDP integration cannot be considered in isolation from the events of 2014, when people left Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk regions for safer regions. Therefore, “human stories” about integration and mutual enrichment were already there, and they are worth retelling.

“The scale for those times was huge. I have made friends since that period. My friend from Crimea is a Russian speaker who moved to Poltava. He had a home power plant in his yard in Simferopol, and he did not buy electricity from the state. In Poltava, he turned into a Ukrainian-speaking Ukrainian. He started building a power plant in his backyard. It was solar and, of course, half of the people were laughing at him: “This is not Crimea for you.”

He finished it. For eleven months of the year, he does not buy electricity from the state, and his neighbors have already adopted his experience: they have also started building solar power plants on their plots. This is mutual enrichment. And it seems to me that such a story gives much more than any slogans we come up with,” says Andriy Kulykov.

About myths

Andriy Kulikov also draws attention to the fact that the integration of IDPs into new communities and storytelling in the media helps to refute certain myths and stereotypes within society.

“When the question arises as to why there was such a situation in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts that Ukrainian was not perceived there or there was an impression that it was not perceived (although this is not true – the question is how it was introduced there), I often heard that ‘well, yes, they were not abroad, they did not travel to other regions of Ukraine. So, in fact, this situation is typical for different regions of Ukraine.

I recently filmed several interviews with wonderful people from the Volyn region. They are medics and drivers who evacuate military and civilians and now travel to Kherson and Kharkiv regions. They told us that thanks to these trips they learned a lot, because they had never been to the East and South before. I think this is another similarity between us. It also shows that when we try to explain something negative, we are still looking for the guilty in a certain region or in a certain social stratum. In fact, we are very, very similar,” says Andriy Kulykov.

He emphasizes that many myths are “planted” by the Russian Federation, and some myths emerge from “friendly to us, but often not fully aware of Western propaganda.” According to Andriy Kulikov, one such myth that was actively discussed in the spring of 2022 is that people from western Ukraine go abroad, receive social assistance, and rent their apartments to people from the east. The same applies to stereotypes about people from the East that still persist in some parts of the country.

“Such myths are also debunked by positive stories of people. For example, the production of bulletproof vests was quite developed in Kharkiv. But when the shelling started, the production base was destroyed. They evacuated to Lviv and found a common language with local entrepreneurs and authorities. And now the LOC (Lviv Defense Cluster) produces bulletproof vests, and they are of very high quality, no worse than foreign ones.

Lviv, so to speak, gave them the opportunity to do this, and they created a large enterprise in Lviv, which is now employing Lviv residents. When we find such examples in real life, such things are impressive,” says Andriy Kulykov.

He emphasizes that now the attention to the problems of IDP integration should be focused on the field, which will encourage equal partnership. And this is a matter of local self-government.

“In many communities, the composition of the population has changed significantly. And they are not represented in local governments, although they are actively involved in life. Of course, there are these IDP councils, but they have only an advisory voice. That’s why we need to think about how to give these people, who make a contribution to the development of communities, real means of influencing what is happening,” says Andriy Kulykov.

Messages should evoke empathy

The expert agrees that there is a demand for new messages, but, importantly, without generalization.

“For civil society, the audience is often the whole country. And it seems to me that this is absolutely wrong. If our goal is to build messages of interaction, contact with the “other,” this is a toolkit that often should not be based solely on mass communication and the media. First of all, this is the mass market-series, computer games, some novel that everyone will read and read to the hilt. And it will produce this empathic effect. The key task is to give an understanding of who is “hiding” behind different social groups (including IDPs), what was behind this or that person,” the expert emphasizes.

Messages that are relevant at this stage

According to the expert, messages about helping IDPs and effective integration should be based on different principles. If we are talking about successful integration, it is important to formulate the idea in the context of cooperation and mutual assistance.

“If our goal is to solve the problems of IDPs, this should not replace the topics of strengthening cohesion and resilience. The goal is to solve the problem of IDPs. And conditionally, whether I am an IDP or not, how should I respond to this? Provide assistance – okay. Understanding the impact of certain prejudices is also understandable. Accordingly, I then get involved in helping specific people, but this is not about integration or adaptation. This is only one aspect of the problem. If we are talking about adaptation and integration, these are stories about solidarity and mutual assistance, which were many in 2022. Where people could give their last,” the expert emphasizes.

He says that working with a particular social group, when we oppose it to society or isolate it very sharply and do not try to “fit everything into the concept” but work only with this focus, rarely works. She emphasizes that often, in the stories collected for the social project, which can serve as an example of mutual assistance, it was not about helping one of the groups, but rather about the desire to hear each other and do something together.

“There was a story, for example, when a person in Irpin recalled that, despite the fact that there was a real situation of survival, tulips became the impetus for him to return to life. That is, just tulips that were given to her by strangers. Now she has started planting tulips in the area where she lives. And I think it’s very important to highlight this moment of mutual assistance and a certain gratitude. I think this approach is lacking,” says Maksym.

Unsuccessful messages and materials about conflicts

Messages that can be distorted, in particular by Russian propaganda

The expert believes that we need to talk about all pressing issues without being guided by the idea of whether the enemy can distort it.

“The enemy is able to distort everything and make its own thesis out of anything. If we keep quiet about something, it is not a guarantee that the Russians will not use it. If we tell a story that is very good for us, it is not a guarantee that the Russians will not change just two or three words and use it again. That’s why I believe that we need to talk about everything, and first of all about the problems,” says Andriy Kulikov.

Maryna Hovorukhina

Maryna Hovorukhina confirms the idea of a constructive approach to covering problematic topics. In particular, conflicts in communities. She observes the demand for solutions journalism in her communication with the authorities and NGOs.

“Conflicts can also be talked about in stories. As far as I know, communities are now using different tools to overcome such challenges. There are completely different ways in which this is solved. These can be presented as success stories. Through the story of one person, you can see what happened in the community. Even before the full-scale invasion, there was a huge demand for solution journalism. That is, when a journalist does not just tell us that there is a problem, but shows us options for solving this problem and resolving the situation, how it is done, how it can be done, what recommendations are available, etc.” says Hovorukhina.

She emphasizes that solutions journalism is in demand by society, as we have a large array of news with messages about problems that cannot be solved.

Natalia Proskurenko

Natalia Proskurenko, program coordinator of the Right to Protection Foundation, speaks about the appropriate focus of information.

“If the messages focus on the difficulties of integration caused by cultural differences between IDPs and host communities (religion, language, etc.), they can easily become subject to manipulation and distortion. But even without Russian propaganda, the perception of such messages in society could be negative. Therefore, it is worth focusing not on integration despite differences, but because of them – a new angle of vision, new knowledge and skills brought by IDPs. The primary reason for all the difficulties is the Russian aggression against Ukraine,” says Proskurenko.

She also adds that the Foundation is now seeking the opinions of internally displaced persons themselves, as well as the involvement of experts.

“Over the two years of full-scale war, a certain culture of communication about socially significant phenomena has developed. First of all, IDPs themselves should speak about the problems of IDPs and on behalf of IDPs. It is important to give them a platform through interviews, stories, and comments. Experts from various fields should be a key component of communication: sociologists, psychologists, etc. Also, representatives of the host community, both at the local government level and representatives of civil society, should be involved in covering stories of successful integration,” notes Natalia Proskurenko.

Maxim Eligulashvili

The expert notes that in order to discuss the problems of a particular social group, it is better to communicate with a focus on the call to “hear each other.”

“We have to communicate about IDPs. But we are going through the war together, and everyone has different experiences of it. At facilitated discussions and meetings, I talked to participants who, in my opinion, were going through hell. This is connected with torture. But they may be more psychologically resilient than people who watched the war through social media. This should definitely be taken into account in communication. We want to build relationships, and this means talking about the requests, needs and interests of all participants. It is important to understand how to build such a relationship, what stories need to be told. And what kind of storytelling will strengthen “the search for understanding of the ‘other’ and self-awareness,” the expert says.

How to talk about conflicts

Maksym Yeligulashvili emphasizes that conflicts and prejudice against newcomers often arise because they “highlight” a problem that has already existed in the community and has not yet been resolved. For example, the lack of places in schools and kindergartens, which is not directly related to IDPs. He argues that discussing such and other conflicts can be a starting point for changes in interaction and at the community level in general.

“We definitely need to talk about conflicts, but with an understanding of the context. It is also important to consider whether our material is about a conflict or a broad generalization. If it adds to the formation of prejudice and reinforces the “neither here nor there” attitude, it is a marker of an ineffective message, sometimes even dangerous,” the expert says.

He adds that it is important to express support and avoid hype in such materials.

“And it’s not about censorship, but about the circles on the water that can come from the publication. Because this, in my opinion, is very important: what we will read, how we will read it. And what will remain after this war in our memories and reactions,” says Maksim Eligulashvili.

Therefore, those journalists who are involved in covering the problems of IDPs in the media, their successful integration into new communities, should not only consult and cooperate with local authorities and foundations that collect and analyze information in this field, but also understand their own responsibility for the texts that are released into the larger information field and can shape the readers’ (viewers’) perceptions of a large social group where each person has their own face, loss and hope for a common environmental future in Ukraine.