Participatory Policy Making, Policy brief

The Participatory Policy Making policy brief is an outcome of the UPLIFT project, which aims to understand the patterns and trends of inequality across Europe, focusing on young people (aged 15-29) in urban areas. Through a range of methods, the project seeks to understand how individuals experience and adapt to inequality, and – together with communities in four locations – aims to co-design a policy tool to involve young people in the creation, implementation and monitoring of policies seeking to reduce inequalities.

The project uses existing data sets to understand the different factors contributing to socio-economic inequality particularly in the domains of housing, education and employment in 16 different urban areas across Europe. These have been selected as research sites for their range in economic potential and redistributive environments. At eight of these sites the partners conduct further research, investigating individual experiences of inequality thorough interviews and workshops with both young people and adults. In a final four cities, Amsterdam, Barakaldo, Tallinn and Sfântu Gheorghe, the project explores policy co-creation.

Together with the UPLIFT researchers, young people in each of these four areas design potential policy solutions to address their experiences of inequality. Through the reflexive policy making agenda, UPLIFT aims to develop a new, sustainable, participatory policy co-creation process, where young people are actively contributing to policies that directly influence their life chances.