UNESCO 75th Anniversary

Young people have potential and an increasingly  important role to play through advocacy and intervention for achieving  meaningful change and progress in educational, scientific, social and  cultural avenues, as change-makers and leaders of tomorrow, as there is  an urgent need to create more space and opportunities for them to  contribute to decision-making through non-tokenistic leadership roles  and global youth mobilization, within NGOs and beyond.

The United Nations adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)  in 2015 to call for ending poverty, protecting the planet, and ensuring  that people across the world enjoy peace and prosperity by 2030 [1-6].  To achieve these goals, young people not only have the right to a voice  but also disparate platforms to advocate for causes they believe in and  network with individuals they relate to [7-10]. The world in its present  circumstances faces new challenges that are emerging, even as we find  that old ones are changing in their forms, to thereby present  difficulties over and above any mitigation strategies utilized against  them. These challenges vary from climate change, resource depletion,  poverty, and malnutrition to illiteracy, deculturalization, conflict,  changing disease patterns, as well as gender, racial and ethnical  inequalities.

Non-governmental organizations have played a pivotal role in not only  supplementing the governmental responses to these challenges, but in  also taking the initiative in eradicating these challenges based on  their capacities and involvement at the grassroots [11-13]. Within such  organizations, youth participation has become imperative to initiate  policies and programs for sustainable change. However, there is still a  lot to be done to encourage and increase youth mobilization and  involvement in the work and decision-making of NGOs and social movements  for positive change in the world. The United Nations defines ‘youth’ as  individuals aged between 15 and 24, although this definition is  flexible. ‘Youth’ is a rather fluid category, with the experience of  being young varying substantially across the world, between regions and  nations, and therefore, context is always an important element in one’s  definition of youth. This contextual approach to engaging with, and  encouraging, youth participation and mobilization is important. 

In the past, access to opportunities and leadership positions and  experiences for the youth in various non-governmental organizations and  social movements have been limited. Young leaders can help in building  on their individual and organizational values and processes, and  establish effective modes of contributing to the operations of their  organization(s). Furthermore, it is commonly seen that top-tier  leaderships are not always connected with the youth members in the  organization in a regular and systematic manner. It is pertinent to  address this communication gap, and facilitate intergenerational  dialogue, mentoring and capacity building exercises in order to  facilitate youth contribution to activities and decision-making within  the organization in an informed and comprehensive way. Addressing the  needs and interests of the youth, which constitutes a community in  itself and must be regarded as such, requires us to realize that ours is  a world that is increasingly recognizing and respecting the diversity  of individuals, within and across generations.

When young people are given the opportunity to stand for what they  believe in and understand that their voices can foster positive change  in the world, especially when equipped with knowledge, opportunities,  and tools to undertake proactive initiatives to address challenges faced  by our world, they can stand for their beliefs and causes with courage,  pride and ability. Youth have the ingenuity, the potential, and the  capacity to make meaningful change happen – for themselves, for their  communities, and for the world at large. We believe that we must  encourage engagement of youth in NGOs’ actions from design and strategy  to implementation and follow-up, with the creation of spaces for youth  within organizations, in their communities by scaling up youth-led  initiatives, by promoting partnerships and in policies by integrating  youth concerns, issues and interests.

Recommendations

As youth-representatives associated with a myriad of NGOs and  movements around the world, we posit and propose points of interest and  relevance to promote youth participation and leadership for meaningful  change in educational, scientific, social, and cultural directions. We  believe that:

1. young people are best placed to determine the interests of youth  and should be given ample space, opportunity, and support to pursue  their issues of interest.
2. it is essential to create spaces for youth within NGOs and beyond,  wherein youth-members can proactively discuss and initiate actions to  contribute towards the aim of their respective organization. 
3. young people must be recognized as both individuals and members of a  community with distinct interests, objectives and tendencies, which  have to be harnessed, in synergy with the thinking and functioning of  the senior members and leadership. 
4. it is of utmost importance to facilitate non-tokenistic leadership  opportunities for youth-members, particularly at the very highest levels  of the organizational structure. 
5. specific responsibilities, clear communication channels and  prioritizing awareness-building exercises relating to various  deliberations and policy-steps (especially of and by the organizational  leadership) can be helpful in enabling the youth to make informed and  proactive contributions to the organization.
6. modularity and a decentralized engagement process of the  organizational leadership with the youth-members will encourage their  involvement and participation.
7. youth-participation in NGOs can be encouraged and promoted with  comprehensive mentoring and capacity-building of the youth-members  within the organization that facilitate value-addition and increase in  knowledge and competence of youth-members, thereby equipping them with  the requisite resources to contribute to the work and decision-making  processes of the organization.
8. a ‘bottom-up’ structure within organizations helps feed information  on activism and advocacy undertaken by young people at the grassroots  to the top tiers of the organization and recommend a collaborative  spirit within the organization and beyond, among the youth-members and  between the youth-members and other stakeholders, particularly the  organizational leadership. 
9. inclusivity and diversity must be encouraged by organizations in  their youth membership and leadership. We believe that intersectionality  must be considered in the formulation of ways to engage with, and  encourage the participation of, youth with diverse identities, in the  work and decision making of the organization.
10. there needs to be independence of assessment by organizations  based on distinct conditions in various countries of origin and/or  operation to ascertain the strategies for encouraging youth advocacy as  well as the basis for greater inclusivity and diversity in their  organization.

Specific Recommendations

1. effective and regular dialogue and engagement with and among youth  members can be undertaken with the creation of intra-organizational and  widely representative youth modules that can conduct regular discussion  groups and propose policy/program suggestions to the organizational  leadership. 
2. non-tokenistic leadership positions and specific roles for  youth-members can be facilitated by ensuring young people have chances  to have ownership and leadership over processes, regularly incorporating  suggestions and points by the youth leaders in minutes of meetings,  policy, and position papers, as well as strategy plans for the  organization.  
3. simulation exercises (particularly with case-studies) can be used to  build empathy and give youth an experience taking difficult  action-steps in real time, while reflection activities can help the  youth to personally engage with the organization’s work and think more  critically and deeply on what they are engaging with. 
4. a central hub of information and resources, relating to the work and  decision-making of the organization, that is easily accessible to all  youth members (online and/or offline) should be created. 
5. opportunities within organizations should be created for capacity  building and value addition of youth-members, with both `hard skills’  (such as organizational management and modes of outreach) and `soft  skills’ (such as communication skills and management of interpersonal  conflict).  
6. opportunities for youth-members and leaders to interact with senior  members and leaders in organizations could be in the form of shadowing  schemes, mentoring programs or buddy schemes (especially for  mentors-mentees who do not have a big difference in age).    
7. there must be an emphasis on creating opportunities to provide more  exposure to young leaders, helping them network and find new and  innovative opportunities to express themselves. 
8. the existing youth-leaders within organizations can be encouraged to  reach out to their communities through outreach programs to inspire and  motivate more young people to join the organization and cause. 
9. a variety of technologies can also be utilized to spread the word  about the work of the organization and engage with the youth beyond the  organizational membership. 
10. the prioritization of collaborations between different  cross-sections of the membership is recommended, particularly with and  among youth-members, as well as collaborations with external bodies and  organizations such as grassroot youth-movements