CONTEXT & ORIGINToday, a multicultural Europe, that is to say, people with different cultural identities living side by side, is an increasing reality. Whether due to a current and future large influx of refugees in Europe or due to the need of immigration in Europe to compensate for demographic decline, the cultural diversity in Europe is set to increase.However, the normative-multicultural policies that were put in place in the 1970s where culture is seen as fixed, with rigid collective identities, have in some ways served to fuel nationalism, polarisation, radicalisation and xenophobia. This situation is compounded by significant levels of immigration and difficult economic times. European leaders such Angela Merkel have made statements to this effect, such as “"Of course the tendency had been to say, 'let's adopt the multicultural concept and live happily side by side, and be happy to be living with each other'. But this concept has failed, and failed utterly” (2010).Youth For Understand believes that multiculturalism is not enough. There is a need for the development of intercultural competences (from a young age) and for an increase in genuine intercultural dialogue between the diverse (and and especially new) cultural communities within Europe. There is a need for young people to recognize the value of diverse personal and cultural trajectories when they come together in intercultural encounters. It is through such open approaches of people with intercultural competences that diversity can be turned into a strength, leading not only to greater creativity and innovation, but a greater common understanding and adherence to the common EU values of solidarity, human rights, tolerance and equality.AIMS & OBJECTIVESThe aim of Routes&Routes is to organize a youth exchange for a group of young people that will contribute to the development of their capacity for intercultural dialogue with their communities, and develop the capacity of YFU to engage in new ways and with more people in local communities on the topics of migration and intercultural dialogue. The specific objectives of the project will be to: — provide a space for exchange and discovery on the topics of identity, adaptation, integration, power, stereotypes and intercultural encounters; — compare experiences and challenge preconceived notions of mobility and migration; — use non-formal education (especially experiential learning methods) to connect, exchange and learning from local Italian migrant and refugee associations; and — empower participants to become actors for intercultural dialogue upon their return home.The Routes&Roots youth exchange will target 46 participants from Austria, Belgium Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy, and will gather them together in Genoa from 19 to 25 March 2016. There they will participate in NFE workshops on the topics of the project and engage in experiential learning activities through fields visits to the project Migrantours and the local refugee association Cambalache. Group Leaders experienced in NFE will ensure an NFE approach to debriefing these experience so participant learn from one another and direct their own learning. The results of the project, a project video and summary report will be disseminated widely. In addition, participants will be encouraged to return home and organise their own “ExchangeTours” in order to multiply and share their learning with other people in their local communities. The impact on participants will be to help them develop an understanding of liquid and situational nature of identity; immigration and related issues (e.g. political approaches to immigration such as assimilation, integration, and multiculturalism vs interculturalism); and knowledge of a diversity of discourses surrounding immigration. The project will also increase their capacity to look at issues through different perspectives; be more conscience of their own cultural stereotypes; and help them to be able to put aside their cultural stereotypes while observing new intercultural situations. Finally, participants are expected to increase their motivation to become active citizens and actors for intercultural dialogue; their curiosity in the Other; and their skepticism of their own stereotypes and messages about “strangeness” and the Other, promoted for example by the media. For YFU, the project will increase the network’s capacity to reach new publics through new types of actions, all the while using its expertise in intercultural youth exchanges.