Our Mission
Cittadinanza was established in 1999 in Rimini (Emilia Romagna, Italy) in order to provide assistance and support to those suffering from mental illness and living in conditions of poverty in low income countries.
Cittadinanza (Citizenship, in english) aims at removing their mask of shame, giving them back their ‘citizen’ image, their inalienable human and civil rights.
In all our interventions we apply a series of principles that we consider integral part of our action:
a) we believe that discrimination against people with disabilities is a severe violation of dignity and value of human beings;
b) we recognize the utmost importance for people with disabilities to enjoy autonomy and independence, including the right to choose and decide their own future;
c) we fight for the deinstitutionalization of psychiatric hospitals, promoting a public health approach;
d) we support a community-based approach, which foresees the direct involvement of all relevant local actors (schools, social services, families, local authorities, etc.);
e) we train local personnel, since we strongly believe that professional growth of local human rsources is a key factor for the implementation of succesful and sustainable projects;
f) we consider beneficiaries as ‘equal’ partners of our projects;
g) we respect local culture and traditions, though recognizing universal validity to fundamental human rights;
h) we make sure that our projects are not used as political or religious means, and we do act with the highest neutrality while ensuring full respect for local and international staff’s believes and opinions;
i) we commit ourselves to assure that our communication campaigns will never harm the dignity of mentally ill people, including when denouncing violations of their rights;
l) we feel charged with high responsibility towards our donors, partners and project counterparts and we therefore commit ourselves to guarantee the highest transparency in all our activities.
