BICC Meeting - Vote 16 - Block 2 by Jugenddialog

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

Has your Youth Council done advocacy efforts work around Vote 16?

What’s the biggest challenge you've faced / would you expect to face in promoting Vote 16?

What’s one advocacy strategy that has worked well for your Youth Council?

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

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Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

We act in three phases:

In-phase: gathering input from experts, international level, doing a questionnaire, talking to young people etc.
Haert-phase: writing phase, we build a solid base to start our advocacy on. What concrete goals do we want to change and what are our recommendations?
Out-phase: Advocacy. We go to policy-makers, the media, start a campaign etc. on the approved advice.

This structure grants a certain legitimacy and has worked well in the past. Ex. Vote 16 - advice and campaign. (we did youtube videos, with young people, experts and with a politician of every party to really map out the societal views)

Biggest challenge: getting our message across, very difficult line: Why 16?

Advocacy: Vote 16 campaign (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QXg2X1oRxI) + Tisaanu (https://tisaanu.be/nl)

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

Our NYC has not picked up the Vote 16 topic and we did not make any campaigns for it. I think the biggest challenge for us would be overcoming the general opinion that we, as a nation, are not ready to lower the voting age. Also, it is not a huge topic in the media nor it is involved in any policy or youth strategy.

In my personal opinion, the best youth strategy was linking the first and third sectors and making them work together. Lobbying and campaigning on social media are also useful. We strike with double force!

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

We have collaborated with local youth councils to promote awareness of the importance of youth representation in elections. Many youth councils under the BYC have engaged in petition drives, local council presentations, and social media campaigns to push the issue to the forefront in their communities. These councils often work to educate both young people and adults on the benefits of extending the vote to younger citizens. APPG in 2018

One of the biggest challenges is overcoming the perception that 16- and 17-year-olds are not mature or informed enough to vote responsibly. Another challenge involves gaining substantial media attention and support from decision-makers in government.

An effective strategy has been building partnerships with local schools and youth organizations to host informational sessions and workshops.

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

The biggest challenge in The Netherlands regarding vote 16 is the public attitude towards the subject. The bearing capacity is quit low and there are not much campaignes on either changing this phenomenon or educating the people on the subject. Another issue would be that there is no single party who is willing to fight for this cause, so instead of a discussion about vote16, there is no discussion at all because everyone is against.

Advocacy strategies that have worked for us in general are finding allies who work on the same causes and subjects. We also use a lot of research to legitimize ourselves and our work. We also have structurally meetings with policy makers at the ministry or ambassadors or representatives from both the European Parliament and the European Commission.

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

Not reallt for the last 9 years

Usual comments like :

they don't know enough
they are easily manipulated
they are not interested

As voting is mandatory in Luxembourg, it will be an additional question to know if vote 16 should also be mandatory

Politicians do not see it as a priority and the actual governement has been partly against it in the past

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

Yes, RmS is actively pushing the topic of Vote 16 forward, opening it as a dialogue during working groups or podcast interviews, as it is the first step to raising awareness on this topic.
From politicians we would expect dismissing the topic as not being their priority. From the general public we would expect pushback to lower the voting age due to the expectations of insufficient knowledge in young people in the field of politics and their inexperience in general. On the side of the youth NGOs we expect lack of interest in this topic (again not being the priority topic).
The topic is popular with our podcast listeners.

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

The Youth Council’s work on Vote 16 has primarily centered on researching the topic and facilitating discussions through the MoreIn24 campaign.

However, several key challenges have emerged, including young people often feeling their lack sufficient knowledge and are hesitant to speak up, limited general awareness, and skepticism from adults. Additionally, the limited access to key stakeholders, despite strong connections with the Ministry of Culture and Innovation.

An effective advocacy strategy has been workshops, which helped us better understand the reasons behind young people's perspectives and gather valuable insights directly from them.

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC

Advocacy efforts work around Vote16: https://www.sajv.ch/de/themen-alt/jugendpartizipation/stimmrechtsalter-16

Efforts with National council members
Efforts through civic education initiatives
- ex.: JugendSession, Citoyenneté, We Make Democracy
Alliance with other youth organisations

Biggest challenge: political pushback (Nationalrat in 02.24), also to be expected in the mid-future.

One advocacy strategy that has worked well for us:

Working with Swiss youth parliaments to provide a digital nonpartisan platform and facilitate referendum understanding - https://www.easyvote.ch/de

Bundesjugendvertetung — 2024-10-27 10:58:37 UTC