A recipe for building trust and countering prejudice in Danish-Arab relations

Danish and Arab professionals working together as part of the Danish Partnership for Dialogue and Reform are likely to dismantle mutual prejudices and adopt positive views of each other. The trusting, personal relations that are often built up in the process of cooperation serve to strengthen Danish-Arab 'social capital'. Certain conditions have to be in place to ensure this type of positive outcome of the partnerships, however, and there is still room for improvements.

These are the main conclusions of a new DIIS Report, 'Dialoguing Partnerships' by Marie-Louise Wegter and Karina Pultz. The report examines the degree to which prejudices are countered and trusting relations are established as a result of the dialogue in seven professional, long term partnerships between organizations in Denmark, Jordan and Morocco.

Alongside the report, the authors publish a DIIS Policy Brief, extracting the principal lessons learned from the partnerships that might be useful for other projects aiming to build cross-cultural bridges.