Looking forward for not regretting after that: the educational approach of the ALLMEET project to xenophobia

Abstract

Since the collapse of Soviet Union, the socio-political and economic changes, the unbalanced relationships between the ethnic Russians and the many “visible minorities” and the increased migration flows have caused a growth of xenophobic attitudes in the Russian Federation. This article presents the findings of the Tempus IV financed project “Actions of Lifelong Learning addressing Multicultural Education and Tolerance in Russia” we conducted aiming at counteracting this xenophobic trend through education.
The results of our project have confirmed that education is the first and most important step in tolerance development and struggle against xenophobia in Russia and that the HEIs can be the key actors in this process. Furthermore, in this article we support the idea that a healthy engagement between academics and policymakers is essential to the provision of informed, evidence-based policymaking aimed at solving or at least reduce conflicts in multicultural society.