Roots & Rights is a community‑anchored anti‑racism and empowerment project supporting Africans and people of African descent in Finland. The project strengthens resilience, rights awareness, healing from racial trauma, leadership capacity, and advocacy through trainings, community dialogues, healing circles, and public engagement.
AFARS ry leads this work in collaboration with community organizations, activists, experts, and local institutions. The aim is to support community wellbeing, address racial trauma, amplify African voices in Finland, and influence structural change. The project is funded by Government discretionary funds for the year 2026.
Project need and objectives
This project addresses the urgent need to deal with racial trauma, healing, empowerment, and advocacy among Africans and people of African descent in Finland. Members of these communities are often victims of racism and racial acts that produce trauma, depression and systemic exclusion. Furthermore, the University of Helsinki 2016 research by Dr Aminkeng Alemanji that examines the difficulties and struggle of immigrant background mothers in educating their children on how to survive acts of racial violence, highlights the need for much needed racial sensitivity education. This study revealed the powerlessness and helplessness of parents in the face of racism. This is something AFARS has seen and encountered in our work over the years. The parents do not have the capacity to support themselves or their children and thus, the children are left to deal with racism alone. We are now seeing communities widely impacted by racism – generation after another – and recognizing a dire need for empowerment and education for building resilience and capacity for healing and agency in anti-racist efforts.
This project will focus on African communities in the Uusimaa region for two reasons: majority of Africans or people of African descent live in Southern Finland and in Uusimaa, and secondly, AFARS is based in Helsinki and has access to resources and communities in the Uusimaa region. In order to achieve our objectives, we need to utilise our existing resources and connections. Regardless of focusing the activities in the Uusimaa region, the active communication in our online platforms will ensure nationwide coverage of our results, learnings and best practices.
Many studies have reported that Africans and people of African descent (especially Sub-Saharan Africans) are the most impacted by racism in Finland, and furthermore in the European Union.
References:
Alemanji, A. (2016) World Studies in Education, Volume 17, Number 2, November 2016, pp. 17-36(20)https://doi.org/10.7459/wse/17.2.03
European Union agency for Fundamental Rights (2019). Being black in the EU. FRA. https://fra.europa.eu/en/publication/2019/beingblack-eu-summary
European Union agency for Fundamental Rights (2023). Being black in the EU. FRA. https://fra.europa.eu/sites/default/files/fra_uploads/fra-2023-being-black_in_the_eu_en.pdf.
Finnish Ombudsman (2020) Report on the discrimination experienced by people of African descent. https://syrjinta.fi/documents/25249352/54194549/Report+on+the+discrimination+experienced+by+people+of+African+descent+(PDF).pdf/deb41955-0557-9f98-057f-04f3d7fa56b9/Report+on+the+discrimination+experienced+by+people+of+African+descent+(PDF).pdf?version=1.2&t=1609832422166
The objectives are:
- To build resilience in the African communities and people of African descent in Uusimaa
- Increase rights and social awareness, and active agency of the target group
- Promote inclusive practices
- Empower Africans and people of African descent in Finland through workshops, community gatherings, dialogues, and public engagement.
Project Actions in 2026:
- Action 1: Community Leadership Anti-Racism Training
- Action 2: Community Dialogues
- Action 3: Advocacy and Policy Influence
Connection to the government action plan
The project aligns with the Finnish Government’s Action Plan to Combat Racism (NAPAR) by addressing structural racism, promoting legal awareness, supporting mental health, and fostering community relations. This project directly contributes to the NAPAR by promoting structural change through citizen-led initiatives, and amplifying marginalized voices. This project supports all three priority areas of the 2025 anti-racism grant, mainly focusing on priority areas 1 and 2.