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Department of Educational Sciences and Psychology
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Project duration: 01.10.2026 – 30.04.2030

Creative Interfaith and Restorative Peacebuilding in Artful Learning Spaces and Places (CIRCLE)

CIRCLE involves collaboration with 15 partner organisations across 13 European countries. The project is based on the assumption that cultural and religious conflicts are not only expressed at political or military levels, but are also embedded in narratives, emotions, identities, and symbols. It therefore examines cultural diplomacy as a soft power strategy for peacebuilding and, together with its partners, develops interventions in museums and other cultural learning spaces. The IFS is primarily responsible for the evaluation, which is conducted via a digital, decentralised real-time monitoring system.

Funding

Horizont Europa

Project description

CIRCLE (Creative Interfaith and Restorative Peacebuilding in Artful Learning Spaces and Places) is a research and practice project funded under Horizon Europe. It brings together 15 partner organisations from 13 European countries and examines how cultural and religious conflicts are not only negotiated at political or military levels, but also through narratives, emotions, identities, and symbols.

Grüner Schriftzug "CIRCLE"

From this perspective, the project analyses cultural diplomacy as a form of soft power aimed at fostering dialogue, mutual understanding, and reconciliation in polarised societies. The participating partners address a range of conflict constellations across Europe, including post-conflict contexts such as Ireland and Bosnia and Herzegovina, frozen conflicts such as Cyprus, ongoing conflicts such as Ukraine and Israel/Palestine, and latent tensions in countries such as Greece and Spain.

Building on existing approaches to cultural diplomacy (including restorative justice, emotional citizenship, and arts-based learning), the project systematically reviews and further develops promising practices. This work informs the design of eight intervention-based pilot formats implemented in museums and other cultural learning spaces. These interventions rely strongly on arts-based methods such as storytelling, theatre, music, and visual arts, enabling participants to move from individual reflection to encounters with the “other” and towards collaborative forms of expression; a process referred to as “storyliving”.

The IFS is primarily responsible for evaluating these interventions. To this end, an extended evaluation framework based on the Civic Literacy framework will be developed, capturing not only psychological and socio-behavioural effects but also cultural contexts and underlying mechanisms of change.

A digital, decentralised real-time monitoring system enables continuous data collection across all project sites. The findings will feed into policy briefs, co-creation formats with practice partners, and international dissemination activities.

Lead researcher at IFS

Project management

External project partners