2022 Campaign "Democracy here. Democracy now"

The European Youth Foundation supports the 2022 youth campaign "Democracy here. Democracy now". The EYF launched a special call early in 2022, to support international activities and pilot activities to be organised in 2022, following the Campaign themes and calendar. The special call had 2 deadlines: 1 March and 16 May 2022.
The EYF is also actively involved in other campaign activities.
Follow the campaign on its dedicated website.

As a result of the first deadline of the EYF special call, thirteen grants for pilot activities of local and national youth organisations were approved by the Programming Committee on Youth in April 2022.
Project ”Speak for Diversity”
Organisation: Georgian Youth for Europe
Venue and dates: Rustavi, Georgia; 14/06/2022 - 18/06/2022
Project grant approved: €4035
Description
This project is focused on hate speech and includes a training for 30 young people on the connection between hate speech and freedom of expression. The project will provide the participants with an understanding of the nature of hate speech, and it will enhance their ability to confront it, as part of democratic discussions and civic participation. After the initial training course, participants will run online campaigns. These follow-up campaigns, if successful, will encourage a reduction in hate speech amongst young people.
Project “Be the Change”
Organisation: Mouth That Roars
Venue and dates: London, United Kingdom; 23/07/2022 - 29/10/2022
Project grant approved: €13400
Description
The aim is to increase the agency of marginalised young people aged 16-26 years by deepening their awareness of, and trust in democratic institutions and processes through a programme of experiential learning and the use of creative film and media tools. The project will engage 10 young people in a series of 6 workshops to learn about democratic processes and to develop social media content which will be compiled in a “digital media campaign webpack”, which is the main project output. The webpack should be further promoted to local youth groups, and it should contain workshop plans, campaign videos, links to useful resources. In the project local context there is a lack of civil space for young people, little access to political education and a general democratic backsliding.
Project “My Rainbow Vote: Mobilising Young Rainbow Voters”
Organisation: Društvo Parada ponosa
Venue and dates: Ljubljana, Slovenj Gradec, Maribor, Slovenia; 01/05/2022 - 31/10/2022
Project grant approved: €10000
Description
The project aims at mobilising, empowering and informing young LGBTIQ+ regarding how to react, participate and impact the 2022 elections in Slovenia and raise awareness on what political participation is and how it can impact young people’s lives and future. In 2022 Slovenia will have three elections: parliamentary (in April), and local and presidential (in Sept/Oct). The project activities are organised so as to analyse the outcomes of the parliamentary elections in April and use the momentum to raise awareness on the importance of voting and the needs of young LGBTIQ+ communities to be addressed to the candidates. The project foresees 6 workshops as a facilitated conversation between young LGBTIQ+ voters and decision makers and a digital and live poster campaign for 6 months.
Project ”DEMO - Democratic values and Media literacy for youth”
Organisation: "Yeghvard" youth ecological NGO
Venue and dates: Tsaghkadzor, Armenia; 01/06/2022 - 31/07/2022
Project grant approved: €13820
Description
The project is focused on the topic of media literacy participation. It will bring together 30 young people from across Armenia for a training, followed by the community level actions in the participants’ hometowns. At local level, in rural areas in Armenia, there is a lack of media literacy that undermines young people’s meaningful civic and political participation. The project will foster the democratic citizenship and freedom of expression of young people in Armenia by increasing their level of media/information literacy and critical thinking, equipping them with knowledge and skills to become resilient against disinformation and negative influences. The project will consist of a six-day training camp for 30 young people, followed 10 local meetings with young people across Armenia, to be delivered by participants of the training.
Project “You(th) fostering transparency and democracy at local government”
Organisation: International Voluntary Projects
Venue and dates: Tirana, Albania; 01/05/2022 - 30/09/2022
Project grant approved: €15000
Description
The project is focused on young people’s participation in local democracy, specifically around transparency on youth issues. The project will include training of young people, monitoring of local government and follow up activities. The project will empower young people across Albania to have a proactive role in monitoring youth policies and transparency in local governments and increase awareness among their peers and local communities on this issue. The project starts with the training of young people, after which participants will carry out monitoring of local decision making. Furthermore, participants will deliver sessions to other young people in their community on information rights. Finally, a two-week campaign will be delivered on access to information and its role in democracy.
Project “Youth voice for spreading out democracy”
Organisation: Trade union Educational Center
Venue and dates: Stanari, Bosnia and Herzegovina; 02/05/2022 - 31/08/2022
Project grant approved: €12694
Description
This project is based on the reality of young people in Stanari, where even if there is a local youth strategy, young people lack skills how to hold the institutions accountable and make sure it is implemented. The project hence proposes a series of activities to link young people with local institutions, mostly through capacity building and practical experiences. The project aim is to give voice to citizens which they entitled to introducing them with instruments of citizens’ engagement in order to influence political life of the community. Several activities are part of this project, and they build on each other: preparatory activities, then the training of 24 peer educators, 3 meetings with local decision makers, up to 6 workshops run by the peer educators in high schools reaching up to 100 young people, a final visit to the Parliament/Assembly of Republika Srpska, follow in the last phase of a communication campaign.
Project “Perspectives of Gender and LGBTIQ+ Youth Movements”
Organisation: Association for Educational Development Ekvalis
Venue and dates: Skopje, North Macedonia; 01/05/2022 - 31/08/2022
Project grant approved: €14590
Description
The project aims at increasing the representation of young people in the gender and LGBTQ+ movement in North Macedonia as a step towards a more inclusive and representative democracy, through a training for young activists and follow up by these activists on dismantling fake news and public actions for equality. The NGO will also produce videos and hold a round table to network between feminist and queer activists. The project will empower young people to be active in gender and queer movements, equip young activists with hands-on activism skills and support the networking between the feminist and queer movements. To achieve this, the project foresees a 6-day training for 20 LGBTIQ+ activists followed by actions taken by the participants divided in three groups with different scopes: a. video campaign dismantling fake news on gender and sexual minorities, b. round table discussion on the future of feminist and queer movements in North Macedonia and c. public action to raise awareness for LGBT+ equality.
Project “Youth, Drivers of Change for a Stronger Democracy”
Organisation: Albania Committee of Medical Students
Venue and dates: Fier, Albania; 02/05/2022 - 31/08/2022
Project grant approved: €14727
Description
The project aims at empowering 25 young people to be actors and multipliers about democracy and youth participation. After an initial training course, participants will plan follow-up meetings with students in schools and visibility materials for dissemination. The aim is to create a space for young people to express their views and serve as change agents for other young people who feel the same way. The NGO will produce a toolkit with information and tools used during the training, as well as communication products to raise awareness about youth participation.
Project "Promoting participation through public campaign in Armenia”
Organisation: “Pathway to” inclusive society development NGO
Venue and dates: Yerevan, Armenia, 11/04/2022 - 11/07/2022
Project grant approved: €15000
Description
The project addresses youth participation, with a focus on accessibility. Marginalised youth often lack awareness and skills on how to engage in democratic debates and how to contribute to them. The main activity of the project is a camp where 15 young people come together, are introduced to active citizenship and accessibility and then work on public speeches about those topics to be presented and disseminated as the main output of the project, during a public event for up to 200 participants. A campaign will then further disseminate these speeched to advocate for inclusion in democracy.
Project “Revitalising Italian Democracy: from Fantapolitics to Fantareality”
Organisation: Fantapolitica
Venue and dates: Matera, Italy; 05/04/2022 - 20/07/2022
Project grant approved: €14189
Description
The aim is to empower young people to be the carrier of political change inside the local councils in their cities and towns, by bringing organisational and participatory democratic methods, as well as innovative policies addressing climate change and social inequalities, therefore restoring trust between young people and institutions. The project has three main phases: capacity building of 15 young candidates through a series of 5 online workshops; a 3-days long networking and capacity building event bringing together participants from the previous activity with 10 young local representatives elected in 2021 and some participants outside the NGOs network, representing different political/social movements; lobbying actions targeting local councils in 15 locations.
Project “YOUth democratising Europe!”
Organisation: Organisation de la jeunesse espérantiste française
Venue and dates: Toulouse, France; 14/06/2022 - 21/06/2022
Project grant approved: €14200
Description
The project aims at supporting 16 youth workers to develop their competences on using non-formal education with young people in the region of Occitanie, France. Through better trained youth workers, there will be more youth work and non-formal education activities with and for young people based on the principles of democracy and youth participation. As a follow-up to the training of trainers which the NGO will organise initially, participants will carry out local youth activities on participation and democracy.
Project "Youth Participation Matters"
Organisation: Youth and Civil Initiatives in the Rose Valley
Venue and dates: Karlovo, Sofia, Sopot, Bulgaria; 01/05/2022 - 15/10/2022
Project grant approved: €15000
Description
With this project, the NGO wants to promote active citizenship and youth participation with a focus on digital citizenship skills. The project starts with a survey in schools about students’ participation in political processes, followed by a training course for students and teachers, then by study visits to local councils and the parliament and ends with research developed by participants and published in the form of a booklet. The project is justified by low youth participation and lack of engagement, as well as lack of knowledge about available structures, mistrust in politics, lack of information and interest from the side of decision-makers.
Project “Participation as a path to youth-tailored community”
Organisation: Union Center for Education and Training
Venue and dates: Veles, North Macedonia; 01/05/2022 - 31/08/2022
Project grant approved: €13869
Description
This project aims at building capacities of local stakeholders and groups of relevance, for the development of a local action plan on participation of youth in all local processes of importance for further community development. While in the city of Veles, there are many opportunities for youth, very few of these opportunities are actually used by young people. With this project, the NGO will revitalise youth involvement locally. The project aim is to introduce to the community a new concept of communication and consultations between young people and the local administration. The project includes several phases: it will start with a training for 24 young people from different local structures of relevance for youth who will then be involved in research (survey + focus groups) on youth needs and priorities, a promotion campaign, the draft of a set of recommendations and final consultative meeting with relevant stakeholders (municipality included).

As a result of the EYF special call, four grants for international activities of international youth organisations were approved in March 2022. These concern the following projects that will be organised in May -June 2022:
- “Youth Green-oble Summit”, by YEE – Youth and Environment Europe. This forum will allow 50 participants from 20 countries to meet for three days and develop ideas on increasing local democracy in view of greening local policies
- “The power of human rights education”, by WOSM – World Organisation of the Scout Movement. This training will support 30 youth leaders from the scout movement to develop their capacities on using human rights education within the scout organisations at national level, as a tool to encourage young people’s engagement in society
- “Changemakers of tomorrow”, by IFM – SEI – International Falcon Movement – Socialist Education International. This training will allow 20 youth leaders from the organisation to develop their competences to run local projects based on active youth participation, and develop as a network within IFM-SEI.
- “Advocacy Academy: Connect, Communicate, Change” by WSCF - World Student Christian Federation in Europe. This training will empower 25 participants from 15 countries to carry out local advocacy activities that will reach over 500 young people. In this way, youth leader will lead positive changes within their local and national communities.