The overall aim of the project is to promote inclusive and active citizenship among young people. More specifically, the project partners set themselves the following specific objectives: - SO1: to build the capacity of 60 young people to participate in democratic life. To this end, awareness-raising modules were developed on the values and functioning of the EU; gender equality; migration and disability and other forms of socio-economic vulnerability. The latter topic was replaced by climate change due to the importance of the issue for young people. - SO2: to enable 60 young people to engage with politicians and decision-makers through i) the joint development of an evaluation grid to analyse the programmes of candidates for the European Parliament, ii) the organisation of a national event in each country and a final international conference in Paris, with the participation of two youth representatives per country. - SO3: to promote best practices to achieve inclusive and intersectional youth citizenship across Europe through dissemination and communication activities and participation in national events.
Whilst voter turnout in European elections and perceptions of the EU vary from one Member State to another, youth turnout is consistently below the average across the board, even though young people’s perceptions of the EU are generally positive. There are several reasons for this[1]: - A sense of disillusionment with conventional structures of democratic representation, - The lack of commitment from traditional political actors to social justice and to the realities faced by young people, - An attraction to alternative and more participatory forms of engagement offering a higher degree of self-determination and direct involvement, and - Opportunities for immediate action and direct contact with decision-makers via social media. We launched this project to: 1) empower young people to take action and assert their rights, and 2) create spaces for young people and their future representatives to meet and engage in dialogue, ensuring their voices and needs are taken into account.