Youth-Partnership - Publications

The history of youth work in Europe and its relevance for youth policy today
Edited by Griet Verschelden, Filip Coussée, Tineke Van de Walle and Howard Williamson. Council of Europe, 2009 978-92-871-6608-1

Youth work is a polyvalent and multi-faceted practice. It takes place in a wide range of settings, varies from unstructured activities to fairly structured programmes, reaches a diverse array of young people, touches upon many different themes and cuts across several other disciplines and practices. This versatility is one of the strengths of youth work, but at the same time it may lead to fragmentation and product vagueness.

In this book we take a historical perspective that aims to identify the close links between youth work developments and broader social, cultural and political developments. What are the beliefs and concepts that underpin youth work? How do they relate to the recurrent youth work paradox, that youth work produces active and democratic citizens but at the same time seems ineffective for young people who are excluded from active citizenship? Tracing back the roots of youth work and identifying different evolutions within and between countries help to initiate a fundamental discussion on modern-day youth work identity and to cope in a constructive way with the recurrent paradoxes of youth work.

The different authors highlight the youth work policies in Belgium (Flanders), Germany, England, Poland, Malta, France and Finland.

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Youth Policy manual - How to develop a national youth strategy
Finn Yrjar Denstad Council of Europe, 2009. ISBN 978-92-871-6576-3

What is youth policy, and what major elements should a national youth policy strategy include? How can young
people be consul ted and otherwise involved in developing youth policy? How do institutions such as the European Union, the Council of Europe and the United Nations address youth policy, and how can this work be concretely linked to the efforts of a national government to develop a youth policy agenda?

These are some of the essential questions addressed in this publication. The Youth Policy Manual should be considered a resource, a tool and a helpful guide both for policy makers in the youth field and for non-governmental organisations and other stakeholder groups who advocate for improved youth policy at the national level.

This manual proposes one possible model for how a national youth policy strategy can be developed. It is based on the author’s observations from the countries of Southeastern and eastern Europe, as they gain experience in addressing youth policy in a transversal and cross-sectorial manner and with the active involvement of young people.

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European citizenship - In the process of construction - Challenges for citizenship, citizenship education and democratic practice in Europe
Ditta Dolejšiová and Miguel Ángel García López (eds). Council of Europe, 2009. ISBN 978-92-871-6478-0

European citizenship is still a contested concept, bringing together two notions and therefore two different debates: one around Europe and European identity, and the other related to citizenship and non-citizenship.

Europe, in an ongoing process of construction, should be shaped and defined by its citizens. Young people in particular have a special interest in and concern about what kind of Europe they want to live in. It is therefore important to reflect on how could European citizenship and debates around European identity help and empower young people to actively contribute to building Europe.

The essays collected here address this issue. They present the debates and findings of the research seminar entitled “Young People and Active European Citizenship”, organised by the partnership between the Council of Europe and the European Commission in the field of youth. European citizenship remains one of the main priorities of this partnership.

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It is this apparent acceptance of diversity as a fact and value that this book sets out to examine, in a range of ways, it offers a countervailing assessment of 'diversity; seeing it less as a unifying social imaginary and more as a cost-free form of politics attuned to the needs of late capitalist, consumer societies. The introduction distinguishes between 'diversity polities' — emerging from a range of critiques of social power — and the “politics of diversity”, a depoliticised celebration of difference that replicates the problems of multiculturalism without the benefits of the overt ideological engagement that multiculturalism has provoked.

The essays collected here are developed from a research seminar entitled "Diversity, Human Rights and Participation" organised by the Partnership on Youth between the Council of Europe and the European Commission. The studies gathered here are embedded in 10 different national contexts. They track dimensions of 'diversity' in education, social services, jurisprudence, parliamentary proceedings and employment initiatives, and assess their significances for the social actors who must negotiate these frameworks in their daily experience.

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Social exclusion, the polarisation of the types of chances life offers to different groups of young people, is increasing, it is spatially concentrated in some regions and neighbourhoods and is arguably linked to social class. Race and gender can also contribute to this phenomenon, as can other inequalities such as disability.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Cover picture of the book ""Charting the landscape of European youth voluntary activities"

How does the voluntary engagement of young people enhance their active citizenship and solidarity? Can youth policies facilitate social inclusion through volunteering?

Understanding, explicating, recognising and evaluating the quality of non-formal learning in the youth sector.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Cover picture of the book "Revisiting youth political participation"

Provides an interdisciplinary panorama of conceptual, historical, sociological and institutional analyses of young people and their democratic involvement in Europe today.

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The interdisciplinary contributions to resituating culture combine overviews of relevant cultural theory with the research and perspectives of the individual contributors.