Progress towards meaningful child participation in decision making – a multi-stakeholder dialogue
1st High-Level International Conference of the CP4EUROPE Project
Child participation is, indeed, a transversal topic rooted not only in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, but also in all the Council of Europe Strategies for the Rights of the Child since 2008, and in several of its standards and tools, notably the Council of Europe Recommendation on participation of children and young people under the age of 18.
This project offers the invaluable opportunity to strengthen child participation processes at national and pan-European level in 5 partner countries – the Czech Republic, Finland, Iceland, Portugal and Slovenia – that are striving to integrate the voices of children in decision making, starting to change traditional approaches that prevent children to contribute to what many consider to be “adults’ matters”.
To support and promote the important overall goal of this initiative, the first high-level international conference took place online on 21 October 2021 (14:00 - 17:30 CET) in the framework of the CP4EUROPE project. The event brought together prominent advocates of child participation at European and national level, and initiated the process of a multi-level dialogue, including with children.
Around 115 representatives of the European institutions, national authorities and children held dynamic and fruitful discussions creating a new momentum for the child participation It was through this collaborative energy that the conference succeeded in (1) linking work at European, national and local levels to address the challenges of children wishing to be heard and have their views respected, (2) creating new horizons for child participation in a high level environment through dialogue and mutual learning between adults and children, (3) sharing good practices and lessons learned, as well as reflecting on key challenges in order to guide improvements and build on successes, with a view to replicating them at European level.
The outline and key findings of these exchanges are presented in the below summary report along with a list of useful resources.
