32^nd Congress Session of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe

Youth participation central to the debate on the quality of democratic participation at regional level

What can be done to make the democratic process more attractive and accessible to young people? For representatives of regional authorities, this is an essential aspect of their efforts to improve the quality of democratic participation at regional level. Action is required at many levels: civic education, consultation, collaboration and joint decision-making. The positive experiences presented during the debate highlighted the importance of youth consultative councils and the leading role of digital technology.

Eliot Herman, spokesperson for the Youth Council of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation, felt that by focusing on these different issues, it would be possible to turn round the disastrous state of affairs in which, as it emerged from a Belgian public television survey, “90% of young French-speaking Belgians have no faith in politics and 98% think that politicians are corrupt”. Distrust towards the “system” should prompt a radical reform of our democracies, claimed a Moldovan delegate. He felt that this reform could be guided by the example of Swiss-style participatory democracy: “Citizens do not want to be given lessons; instead, they would like to participate in the decision-making process, even for things such as voting on the construction of a nursery school.”

Regional initiatives for youth participation

The participants in the debate exchanged ideas on several of the best practices for involving young people in decision-making at regional level. For example, the concept of consultative youth assemblies is already very widespread in many member states. The Marche region of Italy has set up deliberative electronic platforms, where thousands of users give their backing to various legislative proposals, whilst the Youth Parliament of the Wallonia region enables young people to help create a Walloon sustainable development strategy. In Alsace, the Alsatian Youth Parliament (PAJ) plays the same consultative role. Since 2011, the PAJ has been discussing all sorts of questions of its own choosing and, through its recommendations and proposals, has been helping to bring about changes in regional policies. At present, a similar assembly is taking shape at the initiative of the King’s Commissioner of the Netherlands for young people in the province of Fryslân. This youth council will work in co-operation with the provincial council. In Turkey, secondary schools elect representatives of a youth assembly which the regional authorities consult once a month.

Digital technology at the service of democracy

The debate clearly showed that, to varying degrees, digital tools and the internet are of benefit to all of these initiatives. At just 20 years of age, Gloria Vitaly, President of the Assembly of European Regions’ Youth Regional Network, stated her belief that E-democracy helps strengthen democracy by providing a new political space for young people who do not necessarily embrace the traditional rhetoric of the media and politicians. She felt that young people badly needed to take ownership of the digital space, with the help of their elders, who must ensure a safe environment on the internet where currently hate speech could be disseminated unchecked. Alexei Orlov (Russian Federation, EPP/CCE), representative of the Republic of Kalmykia, made the point that digital tools were vital to the democratic management of a vast territory, such as his Republic, where the population was widely dispersed.

However, digital tools are not a panacea for democracy in crisis. A number of participants said that the digital divide should be taken into account and reduced by all available means. It is also important to consider the fact that one of the features of participation in online political debates is the swiftness, or volatility, of reactions. For Eliot Herman, E-democracy is above all a means for including citizens in the information and consultation processes, but it is not a true democratic revolution. Applications such as Skype, Facebook, WhatsApp, Snapchat and YouTube are new means for communication between citizens and elected representatives, but they do not radically alter the links that are already there. Keeping a grasp on reality seems to be a crucial issue for young people who tend to retreat into a virtual world. Politics is precisely the management of reality and of the contradictions that it is made up of.