Despite heavy snow delaying their arrival by a day, a group of young Tunisian politicians have started an intense three day exchange visit to the Netherlands as part of NIMD’s Democracy School programme.

The visit is the culmination of a year’s training in the Tunisian School of Politics, together with partner organisations Demo Finland and the Centre des Etudes Méditerranéennes et Internationales (CEMI). Over the course of the week the delegation will visit the Dutch Parliament, engage in meetings with politicians from various parties (including the Speaker of Parliament), meet local politicians, trade unions and the Tunisian Ambassador to the Netherlands.

The visit is based around the themes of national and local politics and social dialogue. A key focus will be on the importance of social dialogue in the Dutch political system in finding common ground and striking consensus on social issues. These themes are particularly relevant to Tunisia in its current democratic transition and with local elections taking place in Spring 2018.

Each year the Tunisian political parties nominate their best young politicians to take part in the Tunisian School of Politics. The year-long training programme involves 45 politicians from 9 political parties. The best participants are assessed with the top 10 then selected for the exchange trip. This year’s delegation are youthful (everyone under 40 years of age) gender balanced and represent all Tunisian political parties with at least three seats in parliament.

The overall purpose of the visit is to inspire, encourage and impart international best practices in democratic dialogue processes.