Özlem Cekic

Özlem Cekic was born in Turkey in 1976. She lived in Finland for two years while her parents worked as caretakers/cleaners at the Turkish Embassy in Helsinki, and later moved to Denmark. From 2007 to 2015 Cekic served in the Danish parliament as one of the first female politicians with a Muslim immigrant background. After her election, her email inbox was inundated with hate mail and threats, and her initial reaction was to delete and ignore each abusive message. But eventually, she decided to take a risk and started replying to each message, inviting the senders to meet and engage in dialogue over coffee. The resulting productive, bridge-building conversations were inspiring. Her Dialogue Coffee Ted Talk has had over a million viewers. In Overcoming Hate Through Dialogue (Mango) Cekic discusses her philosophy and method. The Danish publication Journalisten noted that  “This brilliant and well-researched book ought to be required reading for anyone interested in conflict resolution; it gives nuance to an otherwise stale-mated debate.”