This week we are turning the spotlight on Klaas, working student of the sociology programme and an active member of 11.11.11 for several years. What are his goals and passion? Find out here!
Hello Klaas, please introduce yourself:
I’m Klaas, 28 years old, born and raised in West-Flanders but I live in Molenbeek where I recently bought a house with my girlfriend. I love living in Brussels!
First I studied social work in Ghent, and that’s where the passion or the worry grew to work with social inequality and solidarity. During my studies I did an internship at 11.11.11, and that’s how I got started there. After my internship I wanted to further develop myself, so I started studying sociology. I deliberately chose the VUB because Brussels, the only major city we have in Belgium, is a real playing ground for sociologists. You are constantly in touch with all the different cultures in our society, so it was an easy choice.
It’s also partly thanks to the VUB that I’m here at 11.11.11. A few years ago, the VUB did some projects around the climate debate in Paris, and I was one of the lucky ones that got to work on that. I also went to the climate top in Paris, that was a real trigger to continue working on that.
During my sociology studies, 11.11.11 came knocking with a job opening, and I started working in combination with my studies. That was a serious challenge, and I’ve had to pause my studies a few times, but I’ve been happily at it again since last year.
Wat is 11.11.11 and what do they do?
There are 3 big pillars we work on. 11.11.11 is an umbrella organization for international solidarity (formerly the North-South movement). Many different NGO’s in Flanders, like Oxfam and Trias, are members of 11.11.11, and we represent them towards the government. We facilitate a lot of development work as we support the broad midfield.
We also work on international projects in about 11 countries, mainly in Latin-America, Central-Africa and South-East Asia, and there we focus on projects with a long term impact. So not for emergency help, but for example with political support to strengthen local NGO’s. Together we figure out what they need to increase their impact. We are not big financial donors, but we really look at how they can connect with their own governments, how they can build radio antenna’s to communicate…it can be all sorts of things.
Other than that we also do policy work, on both EU-level and federally, where we try to discuss and/or change policies in a structural way. It might be on climate, migration, mobility, basically development cooperation in general. What we do is we set up awareness campaigns, very characteristic for 11.11.11. We work mainly with international partners, but also in Belgium we think it’s important to have somewhat of an impact and make people aware of what goes on and what goes wrong in the world and how we want to change that with our partners.
We have a yearly campaign, with a different theme each time like migration, food waste, the right at healthcare, etc. This year the theme is changemakers, where we really focus on the strength of our partners.
Often times development work can be quite caritative, with the rich West giving to the poor South so they can survive. We want to step away from that idea and evolve towards an international solidarity. So that’s what we’re campaigning for.
And what’s your role within the organization?
My role has evolved quite a bit. I started as a regional coach, supporting the volunteer groups. 11.11.11 has a lot of volunteers all over Flanders, active in local groups that organize events to raise funds and awareness. I learned so much there and met so many incredible people. It’s fascinating to me how people can put so much time and effort towards a project, that was so nice to see. After a year I switched internally and worked on the coordination of our yearly campaign for 3 years. That has been a fantastic job.
Nevertheless, I hear you are changing jobs this week?
That’s right, I’m going to Bond Beter Leefmilieu (BBL), where I will be a network manager. It’s a bit like 11.11.11, an umbrella organization with about 130 members, but focusing more on climate, mobility, circular economy and (sustainable) food. It’s very interesting to me to dive deeper into those themes, because I personally think they will be the main themes in the coming years and there are many challenges to deal with these issues thoroughly and structurally. I really want to be a part of that.
My job will be to acquire new members and to bring them in contact with each other so they can strengthen one another. For example what can an energy company learn from a mobility company by exchanging good practices? That’s what I’ll be focusing on.
What is prosperity to you?
For me it’s about progress and welfare. It’s about an equal and honest prosperity. An important approach at 11.11.11 is that we cannot attain optimal prosperity without doing it together, on an equal level for everyone. We have to realize that our welfare here at this moment, is only possible because we’ve done some bad things in the past. For example we exploited Congo to bring their riches to us, and now it’s our duty to handle things fairly on an international level. That’s very important to me, that we realize how good we have it here and to make sure we handle things fairly in the future.
I really hope people realize there are limits to what our planet can take. We need to respect not only each other but also our nature. There are some big challenges there and I am very eager to fight and make sure things go in the right direction.
What do you think about documentaries like Cowspiracy and Seaspiracy? Are there any other recent works you would recommend?
I think they are really good documentaries, but at 11.11.11 I’ve learned to be really nuanced. Many of those issues are very complex and you always have different sides to a story. Seaspiracy was a really strong documentary, and still I wonder if that’s really how it is and wat is behind it. You film a specific point of view and edit it so that it will come across as shocking and spectacular for the audience. I know that’s how you have to do it and I like it because it makes people stop and think about their own impact and what they can do as consumers. That’s very important, but the story is so much wider.
What bothers me about these documentaries is that they put a lot of responsibility on the audience as individuals. But there’s a crushing responsibility on our governments and those creating the legislation. You can be as sustainable as possible as a consumer, and try to take everything in account, but eventually it’s the government creating the legislation that can actually really has an impact. Such documentaries always try to make you feel guilty, and that’s okay, it’s important to know that we have an impact as consumers, but also to work on structural solutions and things that will make a big difference. That’s the biggest challenge: how do we as consumers give a signal to our government? Watching all those documentaries can get depressing, but it’s the politicians’ jobs to really make a change.
I don’t have any specific other recommendations, but we just released a book at 11.11.11 called ‘From Charity to Justice’. I’ve only read one chapter but it was by Jason Hickel and I really want to read more from him. It’s really about inequality and how redistribution works and I find that really interesting.
What does the world need from our students?
Enthusiasm and hope, I know that sounds a bit melancholic (laughs). I feel like you can already change a lot with a positive mindset. It’s not because there are a lot of problems and things going wrong, that they can’t be solved and that we aren’t making progress. We are making steps in the right direction, we are booking success. Everyone is much more aware of what’s going on these days, and the Covid-situation is also making making us think, for example about the impact of our commute to work. If we can make some durable changes because of that, it would be great progress.
Students often have interesting ideas about what the world should look like, and once you start working that can quickly change to ‘Is this it?’.
My most important advice would be: don’t forget to shoot for a greater goal, even if it’s intangible. Keep that in mind and keep working at it.
It’s today’s students that will change the coming years so you definitely have an impact, even though you might feel like you are fighting an invisible power. You can really make your mark and you can never lose that positivity.
How has the pandemic affected you and your work?
I personally have been really affected. I’m a pretty extroverted person and I really live off of contact with other people and getting inspired by conversations and discussions. I’ve been working from home for about a year now, hardly seeing my colleagues…but I guess we’re all in the same boat! Everything online, via zoom, it’s a bit difficult in my line of work because we are often working creatively to bring something under the attention of the public. Developing stunts or campaigns, brainstorming online, it’s just not the same as in real life.
What we are noticing is that the Covid-pandemic has really emphasized the differences and inequality that already existed in the world.
What bothers me personally is that the big tech companies are doing so well right now. The Amazons of the world are making huge profits, the billions are stacking up, and from our partners we are hearing that the pandemic-misery has only started in less developed parts of the world. In the countryside of Peru it’s only just beginning, and we are all vaccinated because we have the money. That really shows the duality of our society, and begs for international solidarity even more.
Do you have plans after you graduate?
I’m going to continue what I’m working on, in the same direction. The big trigger for me to continue this programme is that it really gives me a more nuanced look at things and more of a critical reflex. Asking questions like ‘is this correct?’. There is a lot of disinformation, especially around the issues I’m working on. Everyone has their own graphs and numbers, there’s fake news, and I believe the sociology programme to really teach me to ask ‘what are the real numbers?’, ‘how do I interpret them?’ and ‘how do I find the truth?’. That’s an added value that will really help me in my work. If I graduate in 3 years that’ll be nice (laughs), there’s no pressure. I just like the flexibility right now, and we’ll see!
Would you like to find your purpose as well and fight for prosperity? Then take a look at The World Needs You under Prosperity.