This research explores the constraints to youth participation through the mechanism of the National Youth Roundtable. In 1999 the National Youth Roundtable was established as the centrepiece of the Federal Government's `Voices of Youth' initiative, designed to go to the grass roots of the youth population and seek their participation on matters of policy development. This was to be the new interface between young people and the Australian government, replacing the peak body for youth affairs as a more effective participation mechanism.

This research uses a novel policy writing method to explore young people’s subjective understandings of the problems of poverty. Working with five groups of young people, aged 11 – 21, from some of the most financially deprived areas of England, it sought to draw out and explore their “policy imaginary”, or the way they viewed the problems of poverty through a lens of ideal policy responses. It unpacks these young people’s policy imaginaries, and the life-narratives they discussed alongside these imaginaries, within a discourse of individualisation. Across four articles, it demonstrates and explores the complexities and ambiguities of these young people’s thinkings. This thesis begins by suggesting that many of the problems of poverty they identify as important to their lives are structural, and that they understanding the role of collective and political agency, rather than their own individual agency, in ending poverty. It then more specifically explores their understandings of their neighbourhoods and houses, which suggests that individualised factors often identified in other research, such as social contagion and epidemic neighbourhood effects, are not what they identify as most important in their local areas. It concludes by identifying a policy gap emerging along similar theoretical lines. Here, this research suggests that much of the policy directed towards these young people focuses on individualised problems, and their individual agency as a route of out poverty, but that this sort of policy response is not what these young people felt was needed. However, this is not to suggest that these young people downplayed or dismissed their own agency in charting their life-pathways. Indeed, as much previous literature has found, these young people spoke fluently about the agency and opportunities they have in their lives, often seeming ‘hyper-agentic’. However, this thesis suggests that exploring these young people’s policy imaginary appears to create a medium through which they can talk both about their agency and the constraints and limitations low-incomes generate. It allowed them to bridge their highly agentic biographies to their socially structured histories, as they saw them.

In an age where technology is advancing rapidly, young people are often the technology "natives" who understand and utilize its capabilities better than any other group in our society. Along with changing interaction models, youth are learning to "socialize" differently than any other generation has, absent face-to-face contact via digital interface. These types of connections are affecting America's political and social landscape by changing the way youth are orientated into our culture. Many adults complain about the "distractions" of texting, Facebook, and computer games. Yet, these "distractions" might also be a means to engage young people in civic life. Current research shows the power of these technologies to encourage and foster civic activity outside the traditional venues of schools and civic associations. Technology is also being explored in the classroom for its impact on student interest and performance, both academically and civically. Thus, incorporation of technologies into the classroom may be part of the answer to the declining youth participation in our democracy. This study examines the relationship between in-class use of digital media and measures of civic and political engagement. It utilizes logistic regression to interpret data from an assessment given to the 2008 graduating class at Central City High School (pseudonym). Analysis of this data shows that digital media use in the classroom has a positive effect on overall political knowledge, but leaves questions about its ability to affect students' civic capacity or civic commitment.

This study is based on the perspectives of Syrian youth, on how they can contribute to and participate in future peace initiatives for Syria. The purpose of the study is to investigate opportunities and barriers to youth’s participation for peace, as well as the instrumental role of education in learning about nonviolent pathways for change. Thus, the research is conducted through the collection of narratives with a digital survey-interview method, followed by a thematic analysis with primarily inductive approach, putting the views and ideas of the youth at the centre of the study. The results from the narratives show that the youth have agency and hope to act for positive change in their societies, although they simultaneously feel restrained by suffering, due to imposed restrictions, increasing deprivation, and the on-going violent conflict. Following the analysis, the final themes are discussed against existing research on the topics of peace, participation, and education. The importance of education as a tool for peace and nonviolence was confirmed by the research participants’ strong emphasis on the benefits of education. Additionally, the youth propose that education for peace should include practical elements, and that practical skills are also part of building peace. The barriers in the narratives are discussed as something that can restrict people’s opportunities to return at all, however, the worries are accompanied by strong beliefs in cooperation, dialogue, and intergroup networks of care and respect. The final conclusions include emphasis on the need to support existing local and grassroots initiatives for peace, ideally through multi-sectoral approaches, incorporating support both from the humanitarian and the peacebuilding sectors. Furthermore, the youth participants show a great will to partake in creating positive change and building sustainable peace, nonetheless, they also need support to manage current barriers, including to put an end to the violent conflict.

This study is a discourse analysis of media representations of young people’s participation in the summer riots that spread across the UK in August 2011. Drawing on articles published in three UK newspapers The Guardian, The Daily Mail and The Sun this paper critically assesses the ways in which the media identified the behaviour of young people as symptomatic of a general moral decline in British society. Along with the media portrayal of children and young people during these events, the study also highlights the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child as a further way of questioning the reporting practices of mainstream media. Articles 2, 12 and 13 will have specific focus in the study, in order to evaluate the media’s recurrent misrepresentation of young people’s participation in decision making on matters concerning their own wellbeing.

This study focuses on exploring the personal perspectives and understanding of youth engagement within the Canadian context according to youth engagement researchers, practitioners and funders. This study applied a qualitative research strategy and employed phenomenological methods of interviews and focus groups. This study seeks to highlight the key characteristics and trends from the participant’s perspective within the Canadian youth engagement landscape. Building on the tenants of Transformational Learning Theory and the historical understandings of youth engagement, this study explores how youth engagement is both conceptualized and perceived across three key sectors: researchers, practitioners and funders. Finally, reflecting on the key characteristics identified by the participants this study also discusses the further understanding of the complexity of youth-adult partnerships, the civic role of young people and the potential of developing a collective and shared understanding of youth engagement by practitioners, funders and researchers. / Graduate

Building on interviews with young activists of the Euromaidan movement, this paper examines the possibilities for civil society engagement in today’s Ukraine. In Ukraine, the level of civil society engagement is one of the lowest in the postsoviet world, while at the same time millions of people take part in large protest movements. The material shows that, and present explanations to why, young people who are keen to engage do so in many ways, without this engagement resulting in a long-term civil society engagement.

This paper seeks to examine the impact of electoral websites on young people’s electoral engagement, focusing on the 2012 London Mayoral and US Presidential election. It does so by employing an innovative research design to connect the supply and demand side of the equation, including quantitative content analysis and an innovative experiment that allows for qualitative evaluation as well as for an examination of the causal effects of exposure to specific websites. The three specific types of websites examined in each election are: youth mobilization websites, the official candidate campaigning websites and Vote Advice Applications. We explore the effects of these websites on behavioural, cognitive and attitudinal aspects of engagement: likelihood of voting, attention to news, internal and external efficacy and political trust. Research to date on the effect of electoral websites on young people has produced mixed results on political engagement and efficacy (e.g. Tedesco, 2007; Xenos and Kyoung, 2008). We find no direct effect on young people for voting across the websites but we do find a number of significant effects across the other variables, which are occasionally found only amongst those with the lowest pre-existing levels of engagement. This leads us to conclude that the web can create a pathway to participation for young people but this is dependent on the specific type and attributes of the website, the election context and the young person themselves.

no / The African Youth Charter requires African countries to formulate and adopt an integrated national youth policy to address youth concerns. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the African Children’s Charter also confer on children and young people the right to participate in matters that concern them. Therefore in the formulation and adoption of national youth policies the perspectives of young people need to be incorporated. This research examined how young people participated as strategic stakeholders in the formulation of Ghana’s youth policy. The paper presents a step-by-step analysis of the strategies used to involve young people in the formulation of the national youth policy of Ghana. Findings show that although young people had limited opportunities to participate in the formulation of the youth policy, they have been excluded from the implementation process. The paper concludes that the limited opportunities given to young people to participate in the formulation of the youth policy signifies a gradual drift towards youth engagement in the formulation of public policies in Ghana.

In this project I have explored the situation for unaccompanied refugees in the ages 15-22 years. Being seen as part of a homogenous group was something that the girls described as frustrating and prohibiting. They, as all youths, have a need to talk about them selves, on their own terms. My design proposal is an exercise for students and teachers in high school where you are given an arena in the class room to talk about your self, your values and the norms in society. By choosing a role model and create something to wear, challenge the preconceived ideas of what is expected, create positive forward looking conversations and an opportunity to give a glimpse of who you are.  I have looked at the relations between the individual, the unaccompanied refuge girl, and the people working in the Swedish welfare system. With the help of materiality I have explored the notion of individuality, personal space and respect.  How to challenge societal norms, prejudice and expand the idea of what is possible? / I detta projekt har jag undersökt situationen för ensamkommande flyktingtjejer i åldrarna 15-22 år. Tjejerna gav uttryck för att det var begränsande och frustrerande att bli sedd som en del av en homogen grupp. De, liksom alla ungdomar, har ett behov av att få prata om sig själva på sina egna villkor.   Projektet resulterade i ett designförslag i form av en övning för alla studenter och lärare på högstadiet som skapar ett utrymme för att prata om värderingar och de normer vi har i samhället. Genom att välja en förebild och att skapa något att bära, kan man i klassrummet utmana förutfattade meningar om vad som förväntas av en, skapa positiva framåtsyftande samtal och ge de personer som finns runt dig i vardagen en liten skymt av vem du är. Jag undersökt relationerna mellan de ensamkommande tjejernana och personer som jobbar i välfärdssystemet. Med hjälp av materialitet har jag utforskat begreppen individualitet, att ta plats och respekt. Hur kan vi utmana våra fördomar, rådande normer och vidga tanken på vad som är möjligt?