Young Peacebuilders: Exploring Youth Engagement with Conflict and Social Change

2007 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 63-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lori Drummond-Mundal ◽  
Guy Cave
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Conflict Transformation ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
Youth Engagement ◽  
Critical Approach ◽  
Transformation Theory ◽  
Child Rights ◽  
Conflict Zones ◽  
Peace Processes ◽  
Constructive Engagement

Changes in the nature of war in the course of the last century are thrusting young people inevitably into more intimate relationships with conflict. This article builds on a critical approach to the issues of young people living in conflict zones which promotes their agency in conflict transformation and peacebuilding. ‘Participation’ is explored in the context of conflict transformation theory and is linked with child rights-based approaches to development. Examples of young people's contributions to peacebuilding in several parts of the world are shared demonstrating their political and social capacities. The article concludes that there is a need to understand how young people perceive conflict and what drives some to become involved in violent conflict when others choose non-violence. It is argued that it is necessary to seek non-violent ways for young people to impact conditions that lead to, and out of, conflict. This will require young people's empowerment. Development actors can look to models of conflict transformation and peacebuilding to better understand how to promote inclusion of young people in peace processes and their more constructive engagement with conflict.

RAISE IT UP!! Youth Arts and Awareness

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Natasha Thomas-Jackson
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
Young People ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Community Leaders ◽  
Youth Engagement ◽  
Literary Arts ◽  
Systemic Oppression ◽  
Creative Self

RAISE IT UP! Youth Arts and Awareness (RIU) is an organization that promotes youth engagement, expression, and empowerment through the use of performance and literary arts and social justice activism. We envision a world where youth are fully recognized, valued, and supported as artist-activists and emerging thought leaders, working to create a world that is just, intersectional, and inclusive. Two fundamental tenets shape RIU’s policies, practices, and pedagogy. The first is that creative self-expression and culture making are powerful tools for personal and social transformation. The second is that social justice is truly possible only if and when we are willing to have transparent and authentic conversations about the oppression children experience at the hands of the adults in their lives. We are committed to amplifying youth voices and leadership and building cross-generational solidarity among people of all ages, particularly those impacted by marginalization. Though RIU is focused on and driven by the youth, a large part of our work includes helping adult family members, educators, and community leaders understand the ways in which systemic oppression shapes our perceptions of and interactions with the young people in our homes, neighborhoods, institutions, and decision-making bodies.

scholarly journals Facilitating Sustainable Outcomes for the Organization of Youth Sports through Youth Engagement

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 2101
Author(s):  
Anna-Maria Strittmatter ◽  
Dag Vidar Hanstad ◽  
Berit Skirstad
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Youth Sports ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Project Design ◽  
Organizational Sustainability ◽  
Sport Organizations ◽  
Youth Engagement ◽  
Organized Sports ◽  
Sport Events

The aim of this study was to explore how a youth sport development programme in connection with a major event may facilitate sustainable outcomes for the organization of youth sports in Norway. The context of the study involved the Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederation of Sports’ initiative to increase young people’s engagement within Norwegian organized sports. The result of the initiative was the Young Leaders Programme (YLP) in connection with the 2016 Lillehammer Youth Olympic Games. Young people’s perceptions of the YLP, as well as how these perceptions relate to its implementation, are evaluated to determine the extent to which the programme may make a difference to sustainable youth engagement in organized sports. Qualitative data were generated through interviews with 16 YLP participants, aged 16–20, and five implementing agents. Applying the framework of processes affecting sustainability, the study shows how certain forms of sustainability can be enhanced while constraining other forms at the same time. The findings highlight that project design and implementation play a more crucial role in creating organizational sustainability than in creating individual sustainability. Furthermore, we were able to reveal that the engagement of young people in sport events as volunteers fosters individual sustainability, of which sport organizations and sporting communities should take advantage by providing arenas where young people can re-engage in sport organizations and thus contribute as change agents to a sustainable organization for youth sports.

scholarly journals An Assessment of the Causes of the Madhesh Movement 2015

2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 31-48
Author(s):  
Sedunath Dhakal
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Factors ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
Conflict Zones ◽  
The Past ◽  
Regional Conflict ◽  
The People ◽  
Maoist Insurgency ◽  
Major Factors ◽  
Ethnic Movements ◽  
Conflict Period

Conflict in a place is not caused by only a single factor. Many socio-economic, political and cultural factors are responsible to create a violent conflict. Nepal faced socio-political and regional conflict during the past decades, particularly after a decadelong Maoist insurgency had come to an end with peaceful resolution. The people’s movement 2062-63 overthrew the century-long monarchy system of governance, but there occurred different ethnic and regional movements for the identity and recognition. The Madhesh Movement of 2007 and 2015 were very remarkable for the socio-political changes in Nepal. There are many reasons behind Madhesh Movement 2015. This paper has analyzed the four major factors that caused the Madhesh Movement 2015, which are: (i) Poverty, Discrimination and Exploitation (ii) Exclusionary Nature of the State (iii) Influence of Ethnic Movements of Nepal in the Madhesh Movement 2015, and (iv)The Madhesh Movement for Identity. Although the movement occurred throughout Madhesh, four major conflict zones viz. Biratnagar, Janakpur, Birgunj, and Tikapur were taken as the research site. Owing to the same fact, this research paper is based on the response of the people from the conflict zones, experts’ opinions about the conflict, and the selected newspaper opinion articles during the major conflict period.

scholarly journals Epilogue: Rethinking digital literacy: Media education in the age of digital capitalism

2020 ◽  
pp. 230-239
Author(s):  
David Buckingham
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Digital Literacy ◽  
Media Education ◽  
Digital Learning ◽  
Critical Approach ◽  
Pedagogical Strategies ◽  
Digital Capitalism ◽  
The Media ◽  
Digital Media Literacy

Advocates of digital education have increasingly recognized the need for young people to acquire digital media literacy. However, this idea is often seen in instrumental terms, and is rarely implemented in any coherent or comprehensive way. This paper suggests that we need to move beyond a binary view of digital media as offering risks and opportunities for young people, and the narrow ideas of digital skills and internet safety to which it gives rise. The article propose that we should take a broader and more critical approach to the rise of ‘digital capitalism’, and to the ubiquity of digital media in everyday life. In this sense, the paper argue that the well-established conceptual framework and pedagogical strategies of media education can and should be extended to meet the new challenges posed by digital and social media.This article presents some reflections as an epigraph of the special issue "Digital learning: distraction or default for the future", whose final result has allowed us to group a set of critical research and analysis on the inclusion of digital technologies in educational contexts. The points of view presented in this epigraph is also developed in more detail in the book "The Media Education Manifesto" (Buckingham, 2019).

Transitional intervention strategies for conflict transformation in the South Caucasus

2014 ◽  
Vol 2 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 130-141
Author(s):  
Tabib Huseynov
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Good Governance ◽  
Conflict Transformation ◽  
Institutional Arrangements ◽  
Intervention Strategies ◽  
The South ◽  
South Caucasus ◽  
South Ossetia ◽  
Peace Processes ◽  
State Models

This article discusses major policy and institutional interventions needed for conflict transformation in the South Caucasus. It examines how different forms of territorialpolitical organisation of government have been used to mitigate both violent and nonviolent conflicts and how international experience could be applied to promote peaceful resolution of the conflicts over Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Nagorny Karabakh. The article shows how the conflicting parties’ mental fixation on final status stalls peace processes, and argues that rather than discussing end-state solutions or end-state models of governance, conflict parties need to focus on interim (transitional) policy and institutional arrangements that would allow them to normalise relations and set out roadmaps for cooperation and gradual reconciliation. The article also underlines the importance of adhering to standards of good governance and human rights, as necessary preconditions for ensuring the legitimacy, and thus, sustainability, of peace processes.

Young People and Online Risk

2011 ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elza Dunkels ◽  
Gun-Marie Frånberg ◽  
Camilla Hällgren
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Social Construction ◽  
Driving Force ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
European Countries ◽  
Critical Approach ◽  
Empirical Base ◽  
Online Risk ◽  
Layer Cake ◽  
Vantage Points

The authors suspect that the young perspective has been left out when online risk and safety are discussed in contemporary research. The aim of this chapter is to give a critical approach to this matter and question fear as a driving force for protecting young people online. Interviews with children about their views of internet use (Dunkels, 2007) and a study of safe use guides from European countries conducted in 2008 (Lüders et al, 2009) form the empirical base. The discussion in the chapter is underpinned by ideas of childhood as a social construction, emerging ideas of power relations pertaining to age and theories of technology reception. The authors also introduce a metaphor, the layer cake, to better understand how the same action can be viewed from different vantage points.

scholarly journals Minecraft as a Tool for Engaging Children in Urban Planning: A Case Study in Tirol Town, Brazil

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 170
Author(s):  
Bruno de Andrade ◽  
Alenka Poplin ◽  
Ítalo Sousa de Sena
Keyword(s):  
Urban Planning ◽  
Young People ◽  
Youth Engagement ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Societal Actors ◽  
Innovative Tool ◽  
Game Environment ◽  
New Research ◽  
Development And Management ◽  
Culture Of Planning

The purpose of this paper is to explore the potential of Minecraft’s game environment for urban planning with older and younger children in a public school in Tirol town, Brazil. Minecraft is employed as an innovative tool to tackle the present lack of engagement and involvement of key societal actors such as children and young people in urban planning. Thus, how can games support children to co-design their future city? Which heritage values do they represent graphically in the game environment? Geogames are games that provide a visualization of a real spatial context and in this study, Minecraft is the tool which we use to explore youth engagement. We designed two experiments, which tested Minecraft as a geogame environment for engaging young people in urban planning. These experiments were conducted with children, who emerged as active emancipated actors to bring their values to the planning practice. The playtesting results revealed the potential of Minecraft to keep children engaged in the design workshop, as well as their relevant ludic ability to co-create walkable, green, and interactive places. New research questions arose about the potential of creating a culture of planning among children in order to motivate other social actors to share responsibilities for sustainable development and management.

Young People and Everyday Democracy

2019 ◽  
pp. 159-174
Author(s):  
James Sloam
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Youth Engagement ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Government Schools ◽  
State Relations ◽  
College Educated

This chapter poses the question of how young people can be engaged politically both during and between elections. It begins with a discussion of the role of contact and interactions between citizens and policymakers in contemporary democracies, which spring from civic republican conceptions of good and active citizens. It asserts that the civic republican models of citizen-to-state relations are unlikely to work without the intensification of policy engagement at a local level. While small-scale, everyday democracy is a promising pathway to political engagement, contact with politicians and public officials has been overwhelmingly the preserve of those who are predominantly middle-aged, college-educated and financially well-off. To raise the involvement of young people, any localized approach to youth engagement must be scaffolded by political and social institutions: primarily, local government, schools and universities. The chapter goes on to consider the performance of a number of local and national initiatives to engage younger citizens in the policy process and reflect upon the lessons from these experiences.

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