Political and civic participation of young people
The project “Political and civic participation of young people” was created based on one of the six key priorities defined by the current Strategy for Youth – young active citizens are involved, motivated, proactive and participate in decision-making processes, community development, policy making and implementation. projects dedicated to strengthening the competencies of young people to participate in the decision-making process. The need for greater involvement of young people in the decision-making process is necessary in order to democratize society and encourage dialogue with representatives of institutions, especially to improve their position and increase the quality of life.
The identified challenges must be translated into concrete activities that will ultimately result in an increase in the number of young people in the decision-making process, through increased information and skills of young people. Moreover, in recent years, due to the fatigue of citizens from the same political representatives, traditional political parties have begun to promote young politicians in their ranks and programs. They are very easily assimilated into given patterns of behavior without striving to bring about real change and to protect the interests of the young people they are supposed to represent. Young politicians are usually not proactive, nor do they bring new energy that would motivate young people to participate in the political life of our country, because they exclusively follow the ideology of the party they belong to and become obedient to achieve their personal goals. The entry of young politicians into public life is accompanied by almost the same gestures and rhetoric as more experienced and older colleagues, while in some cases we have more retrograde attitudes of young politicians, which the Montenegrin and regional public has witnessed recently.
It is obvious that the rejuvenation of political parties is not essential, but cosmetic in nature, and that the motives for young people to enter politics are related to their personal benefits, and not to improving public policies and rationalizing their implementation, ie reaching the level of social development. for the common good. This is supported by the data from the mentioned research on political and civic participation of young people, which show that only 9 out of 144 amendments were submitted by young politicians or councilors under 30, while only 10 municipalities have over 10 percent of young people in their parliamentary committees.
This indicates the need to develop a culture of participation, encourage activism, improve and strengthen their capacity for greater involvement in decision-making processes, not only to raise awareness of existing mechanisms, but also to use them through improving knowledge and skills in this area. areas through working with the best experts in areas important to young people.
Accordingly, the main activities of the project are aimed at maintaining a single Academy for Political and Civic Participation, conducting an analysis of youth participation after the 2022 local elections and organizing a Regional Conference on Youth Participation in the decision-making process.
The Center for Democracy and Human Rights is implementing the project with the support and partnership of the Hanns Seidel Foundation. The total budget of this project is 19,700.00 euros.
