Youth participation – what have we achieved so far?

At the international level, especially within Europe through the European Union and the Council of Europe, we now have an extensive policy ecosystem that is more able to protect young people’s rights and to promote their participation. In these policies, we have taken significant steps from seeing young people as incomplete citizens in need of training to become suitable adults, to seeing them as group rights holders worthy of the recognition and respect afforded to all groups in society. Within the EU, these programmes, such as Erasmus+ and European Solidarity Corps, support these policies and now make a substantial contribution to youth participation, especially when the right tools are applied.

Theories such as Hart’s ladder, or Lundy’s Model of Participation, are now used on a widespread basis to provide a good understanding of what youth participation is. They provide a foundational starting point that emphasises the importance of sharing power with young people and enabling them to influence decision-making. Research into ‘meaningful’ youth participation supports these models further. We have now mapped out the qualities and standards required for ethical engagement with young people within participatory initiatives. These basic participation models have limits; they are simplistic and mainly apply to small group activities. They also struggle to account for differences of viewpoints amongst young people and the complex reality of policy and decision-making in a pluralist democracy. However, they are a good entry point for anyone seeking to understand the field.

The many forms of participation are now widely understood. These include co-production, youth forums, participatory budgeting, advocacy, activism, etc. With our now advanced understanding of these forms, we have developed a range of formats that can be put in place by anyone wishing to engage young people with democratic decision-making. Most of these formats are based on small-scale group work with young people and sometimes take a simplistic approach to policy making. However, for anyone seeking to develop youth participation initiatives, there are established practices which can now be replicated and shared.

The link between learning and youth participation is well developed. Non-formal methods, such as those based on experiential learning or self-directed group work, are understood to be the most suitable for stimulating young people’s democratic engagement. The skills and competencies that young people need are also well defined through the Council of Europe’s Reference Framework on Competences for Democratic Culture.