Nowadays, young people in Europe face numerous challenges: high unemployment rates, lack of future perspectives, loss of social cohesion, pressure to perform – to name just a few… The consequences? A society that leaves young people with a constant fear of falling behind the social and European developments, with a feeling to fail increasing expectations; a society that threatens the individual young person with social exclusion and the feeling of “not being part” and “not being able to change”. The desire for strong and, even, autocratic leaders who provide simple answers has become quite visible throughout Europe over the last months and years. It is time to act and empower these young people, time to show them: There’s something you can do to change things, there are democratic ways of forming the world around you!
That is where the BE PART – FEEL YOUR PART project sets in: We are developing an approach for the local democratic participation of the young people, considering their social environment and the resources available to them.
While we see the young people at risk of social exclusion as the main beneficiaries of our project, we put a lot of focus on the youth workers who we regard an important link to these young people. Youth workers (employed ones and volunteers) play a crucial role in the participation process of young people. We are offering to them an opportunity to further develop on their professional path by providing them with all necessary knowledge, skills and competences to carry out analyses of social environments and spaces and plan and implement democratic participation projects on a local level.
