Political participation of youth

During this event the topic of political participation of youth was discussed with experts from the UNIC alliance, external stakeholders and the audience. The aim of this event was to exchange experiences with researchers, students and city stakeholders from the University of Oulu, Erasmus University Rotterdam, and University College Cork about the political participation of youth in the respective cities. The discussion continue with the reasons and behavior that underly the interest in politics amongst young people and how this could be positively impacted. Moreover, with this event we also aimed to connect different researchers and city stakeholders from the three UNIC universities to explore this topic further.

The event was divided into two parts. First part was a panel discussion where we gained insights about the political participation of youth in Rotterdam, Oulu and Cork, from three panellists. After the panel we continued to the second part of the event: open discussions with the audience. First an Erasmus University student, explained the importance of increasing trust in politics amongst youth. Subsequently, all panellists and participants started an open discussion, sharing ideas and coming up with solutions on how to increase political participation of youth in our cities. Participants compared the differences and similarities of the initiatives and organizations that exist in their cities that focus on youth and getting youth involved in politics or contribute to society.