SISTER CITY UKRAINE

Sister city, county, and state affiliations between the United States and other nations began shortly after World War II and developed into a national initiative when President Dwight D. Eisenhower proposed the "People-to-People" program at a White House conference in 1956. Originally a part of the National League of Cities, Sister Cities International (SCI) became a separate, nonprofit corporation in 1967 due to tremendous growth and popularity. President Eisenhower's intention was to involve individuals and organized groups at all levels of society in citizen diplomacy, with the hope that personal relationships, fostered through sister city, county and state affiliations, would lessen the chance of future world conflicts.

While President Eisenhower’s intent has succeeded through many Presidents, Foundations, NGOs, Non-profits, and Government agencies there is a need to foster more city to city relationships at a more rapid pace. In the case of the U.S. and Ukrainian sister city programs according to a list from the Ukrainian Embassy website and the Sister City International website there are between twenty-three to twenty-six sister city programs. The accomplishment of these established relationships are encouraging and important; even more so is how significant it is to rapidly increase the sister city programs in the years to come. Especially since judgments on countries intentions are formed more quickly due to the easy and quick dissemination of information through the cable and satellite networks, internet, and cell phone communication. Whether the information is spread in a positive or negative light, governments, business, the general public and even criminal and terrorist groups utilize these technological advantages to purvey their message.
One of the ways to counter the affect of entities propaganda is to establish personal relationships with leaders and publics of countries. The established rapport allows for the potential of a well rounded understanding of a countries culture, people, and intentions. As a result when negative or positive propaganda is disseminated the leaders and publics of a country are more equipped to decipher the validity of the provided information. Consequently a conflict may be avoided or solution quickly achieved, a relationship strengthened, and the validity of a message sent is verified due to the exchange of peoples and ideas through their sister city program.

Forty-eight years after the term of President Eisenhower, a country sometimes known as Undiscovered Europe has roughly 26 sister city programs established with the U.S. These programs are aiding Ukraine in her efforts to move towards a more democratic society with free market principles and their desires to join the international communities within the EU and NATO could one day be achieved.

The increase in sister to sister city associations could be assisted with an effort to further identify and connect the entities working to foster relations with both the US and Ukraine. From years of experience working with academia, government, and private business these groups never realize how much more could be accomplished if they spend some outside time researching who might be in their realm of study. For example, many times the professor working within the same department or at least on the same campus never realizes that their research areas actually converge or that their cooperation could double their results. This can be attributed to an intensive study with limited time and resources or a compartmental mindset, or even just pure ignorance.

The same can be said for a population, nation, and governments who may see each other as adversaries or at least allies with different agendas. Even programs that are set years in advance can tend to become compartmentalized, and the need for linking their efforts exist. With an established sister city program already engaged to day the efficiency and rapid increase could simply be accomplished through a forum such as this blog to connect the links between the governments, private business, academia, and NGOs. Merely a middle man, the Undiscovered Europe Blog seeks to connect the dots or gaps that is what this blog hopes to achieve.

Below are the links for the existing programs from Sister City, NGOs, Non-Profits, Business, and Governmental for the U.S. and Ukraine:

Organizations, NGOS, Non-Profits, Business, and Federal Goverment:
* Sister City International, * U.S. - Urkainian Foundation
* U.S.- Ukrainian Business Council,*USAID-Ukraine, *Hope