ROSA is a political association with an intersectional perspective on society and a queer-feminist, anti-racist foundation. We aim to create safer spaces for everyone and highlight the importance of safer spaces and feminist humanitarian aid.
The non-profit association ROSA e.V. was founded in March 2021 by a group of friends with big dreams. Thanks to the solidarity and volunteer work of many people and groups, ROSA has grown into the association it is today. ROSA takes a critical approach to power, keeps its hierarchies flat, and is legally represented by a board that currently has six members.
Our principles
In order to provide effective humanitarian and feminist support, the following principles are crucial at ROSA:
Accessibility
Our work is not tied to one location. We create safer spaces wherever there is an urgent need. In Greece, the heart of the project is a converted truck equipped with a room for medical consultations, a kitchenette and storage for workshop materials. This allows us to reach people who, for various reasons, cannot access other support services.
Working as equals
A safer space can only be created together. That is why our work is guided primarily by the needs of the people who use it. This creates a wide range of activities, from medical workshops to creative arts and sports projects. Through direct dialogue, we develop activities together and adapt them as needs change. Recognising and exposing neocolonial realities is an integral part of ROSA’s work.
Visibility
ROSA combines practical support for displaced people with political activism. In Germany, alongside that practical support, we seek to amplify the voices of people facing multiple forms of discrimination while fleeing. We see it as our responsibility to make experiences of displacement and the violence of the European border regime visible, to support the political demands of displaced people and to address the causes of displacement. We refuse to accept patriarchal structures as natural. We report critically on conditions in camps and accommodation centres and work towards radical change.
Network
Safer spaces provide a protected setting for exchange, mutual support and learning from one another. When people from different cultures and with different life stories meet, they can develop a powerful sense of solidarity that leads to empowerment (link to glossary) and new connections. At the same time, ROSA is building a network of people acting in solidarity: they connect through local groups, initial reception centres, demonstrations and online meetings, and work together against patriarchal structures and Europe’s restrictive border policies.
Care
As long as states fail to meet their obligation to care for displaced people and fail to provide institutional protection against patriarchal violence along migration routes, civil society must raise these issues and demand that governments take responsibility. In the meantime, we want to provide direct support through feminist practice. Activism is not adequately paid, yet it is needed more urgently than ever. That is why mutual care in activist spaces is an important part of ROSA’s work.
ROSA in numbers
By becoming a member, you strengthen ROSA both in principle and financially: regular membership fees give us predictable income and greater financial security for our work. You can help us sustain our safer spaces and support services independently over the long term. Every new member makes ROSA more stable and better able to act.
Safer spaces will always be needed. More than 2,000 people visit our spaces each year, showing just how important they are.
Our local groups build feminist communities in their cities. Together, we form a nationwide network of solidarity. Join us and find your people!
As a collective and a group of friends, we make decisions about the association and imagine its future together.
The Rolling Safespace at the EU’s external border is organised, driven and supported by a volunteer crew of 8 to 11 people. Thank you for working every day to create a safer place along Fortress Europe!
From funding applications and solidarity parties to language courses and sticker designs: ROSA works only because so many dedicated volunteers are committed to creating safer places for everyone.
ROSA is organised online as a nationwide network. Would you like to support ROSA flexibly from home? Join one of our online working groups on education, public relations, finance and much more!
Each day, we travel between the refugee accommodation centres in Ritsona, Oinofyta, Malakasa and Thiva, setting up our mobile safer space outside their gates. These are among the largest accommodation centres on the Greek mainland, housing between 500 and 2,500 people each.
In Germany, too, people who have fled their homes are often kept in initial reception centres and isolated for long periods. Our local groups and ROSA Consultations offer meeting places for women and queer people living in accommodation centres in their cities.
Since December 2025, ROSA Consultations has held a QueerCafé twice a month in Halberstadt, Saxony-Anhalt. Queer people living in the initial reception centre can connect with one another and receive legal advice there.
The Collective
Fundamental decisions are made by the collective, which brings together the board, paid staff and volunteers. The collective serves as the association’s legal representative and connects its various working groups. It meets every two weeks to share updates from different areas, resolve questions affecting the association and develop a shared vision for the future. We have made a majority of FLINTA people in all key decision-making bodies our standard and continually work to make the collective more diverse.
The Teams
Whether you want to become an association member, start a local group, join the ROSA Connection Community, become part of our crew in Greece, or join an online working group: here are the people behind the email addresses and webcams who keep ROSA rolling.
For general inquiries, please write to:
Greece
Network
Public relations
Administration
