What is political participation?

Search in video 0:00 partnership between the European 0:02 Commission and the Council of Europe in 0:04 the field of youth hosted a symposium 0:06 the future of young people's political 0:09 participation questions challenges and 0:12 opportunities at the European youth 0:14 center in Strasbourg from 18 to 20 0:17 September 2019 young people's 0:19 participation is central to our work but 0:22 what is it that we are talking about 0:24 when discussing political participation 0:26 dan Moxon director of people dialog and 0:30 change and a member of the pool of 0:32 European youth researchers helped us in 0:34 answering this question by looking at 0:37 different forms of political 0:38 participation political participation is 0:41 hard to define politics is all around us 0:44 and not just in political institutions 0:46 in the youth field we use the term 0:49 participation to refer to a wide variety 0:52 of activities phenomena and practices 0:55 there is currently much discussion on 0:57 the different forms and styles of 0:59 participation some of these forms are 1:01 easy to identify as political voting and 1:05 standing for election elections are a 1:08 traditional form of participation in 1:10 democratic society but this form of 1:12 participation is less appealing to young 1:14 people today than it was to previous 1:16 generations youth civil society young 1:20 people also participate through youth 1:22 organizations youth clubs or youth 1:24 councils however not everything they do 1:27 is automatically political some young 1:30 people may be involved in a sports club 1:32 and others in a local or national Youth 1:34 Council innovative approaches from 1:37 public bodies such as co-management 1:40 participatory budgeting and 1:41 co-production involve young people in 1:44 decision-making processes these types of 1:47 participation can significantly 1:48 influence public policies but they reach 1:51 only a limited number of young people 1:53 protest movements young people today 1:56 widely engage in protests and movements 1:58 which focus on single issues such as 2:01 climate strikes and demand immediate 2:03 action on the other hand young people 2:05 are also members of extreme right or 2:07 left populist protests which begs a 2:09 question are all protests to be 2:11 encouraged and if not which one should 2:14 we support 2:15 and why on the other hand some forms of 2:18 participation may be disconnected from 2:20 political institutions having a limited 2:22 impact on policy making these include 2:25 youth activism or youth social action in 2:29 these activities young people take 2:31 things into their own hands instead of 2:33 lobbying decision-makers these include 2:35 actions such as hash tag trash tag 2:38 movement which sought to clean up 2:39 beaches and public spaces from litter 2:42 alternative use of public spaces such as 2:45 political nightclubs focused on gender 2:47 issues is this political activism or 2:49 just a party political memes and online 2:52 political debates have taken over the 2:54 Internet yet are they too disconnected 2:56 from policy and political institutions 2:59 to be able to make any difference 3:01 ultimately politics happens all around 3:04 us and not just in political 3:06 institutions this is why political 3:08 participation can be so hard to define 3:10 one of the challenges of talking about 3:13 politics outside of conventional forms 3:15 such as voting is that it raises a 3:17 question at which point is participation 3:20 no longer considered political at a 3:24 policy level we see an increasing focus 3:26 from policy makers on promoting not only 3:29 conventional but also new forms of 3:31 participation as a way of involving more 3:34 young people whilst innovation and 3:36 development is desirable we also need to 3:38 reflect about what these forms can 3:40 deliver in the youth field currently 3:42 there is a lot of enthusiasm for digital 3:45 methods which offer a lot of potential 3:46 for reaching large numbers of young 3:48 people 3:49 however the youth sector has not so far 3:52 managed to use digital tools to reach 3:54 large numbers of young people in an 3:56 inclusive way rather than focusing on 3:58 which type of political participation is 4:00 better we should think of their impact 4:02 in terms of influence does the policy or 4:06 program enable young people to influence 4:08 politics who do we influence and to what 4:10 extent 4:11 how can people who are excluded have 4:13 more voice Social Inclusion critical 4:17 evaluation of who is included in 4:19 participation is vital which social 4:21 groups of young people are enabled to 4:23 have this influence how does 4:25 participation contribute to the 4:27 promotion of equality and he 4:29 Wright's scale how many young people 4:32 does it reach and how can we reach all 4:34 young people working across the sector's 4:37 to find answers to these and other 4:40 questions about political participation 4:42 of young people visit our website or 4:44 follow us on social media at EU co e 4:47 youth