Youth councils and their member organisations are key players in any viable democracy. In their capacity as “workshops” of democracy, youth associations are where young people learn how to participate politically, form opinions and bring about social change.
Lack of political recognition
In many countries, governments and authorities decline to recognise the role of youth councils as advocates for young people. However, this recognition is essential when it comes to giving young people access to effective participation in political processes and decision-making. Without official backing, many youth councils lack financial resources, legal certainty and direct communication pathways to policymakers.
One example is the independent Turkish youth council GoFor (Gençlik Örgütleri Forumu). It is not recognised by the Turkish government either as a representative of young people or as a national youth council. Consequently, GoFor receives no government funding and has very limited opportunities to inject youth policy issues into the public debate at national level. What is more, Turkey’s civil society groups in general will face fresh restrictions should the planned foreign agent act[1] be passed.
In Croatia, the independent Croatian Youth Network (Mreža mladih Hrvatske, or MMH) is also not officially recognised by the government. Instead, the governing party recently established a national youth advisory forum with the aim of giving legitimacy to the members of its own youth organisation as representatives of young Croatians.
Criminalisation of youth organisations
The self-organised Belarussian national youth council RADA was founded in 1992 and represented Belarussian youth organisations until 2006, when it was dismantled by the country’s supreme court and lost government recognition. RADA is subject to constant repression by the government owing to its prominent role as an advocate of young people's rights and of democratic values. After the revolution was quashed in 2020, RADA was forced into exile. Its secretary-general and other leading members face years-long prison sentences should they return to the country.
In Georgia, youth organisations are under considerable pressure from the government, severely hampering their work and a major obstacle for including young people in campaigns for social change. The government’s foreign agent law [2] stigmatises NGOs that receive funding from sources abroad and places them under heavy restrictions. Similar organisations are exposed to political harassment, surveillance and threats of legal action.
Budget cuts are existential threats
The budget cuts of recent years have brought organisations in the youth sector to their knees. The situation is particularly severe for groups that depend on long-term funding, since project funding is often insufficient to cover basic operating expenses such as rent, salaries or ongoing programmes.
A particularly alarming example of the dire financial straits faced by young civil society groups is the British Youth Council (BYC). After years of financial challenges, the BYC – which was founded 75 years ago – finally went into liquidation in March 2024. According to the BYC, the primary cause was its sustained difficult economic situation, exacerbated by the financial collapse of a long-standing donor from the private sector.
Under the Finnish new centre-right coalition government, the budget for youth work in 2025 was cut by around 5.5% versus 2024 and by as much as 15% versus 2023. The insufficient funding for infrastructure and projects, coupled with rising costs, is creating considerable difficulties for the country’s youth council Nuorisoala. The organisation has had to let staff go and is scaling back its activities.
Active withdrawal of public sector funding
Poland’s national youth council (Polska Rada Organizacji Młodzieżowych, or PROM) has not received any government funding since 2018, when the funds for the EU Youth Dialogue were transferred to a different organisation with closer ties to the government. PROM has since been reliant on alternative sources of funding and does most of its work on a voluntary basis. Despite a change in government and a sense of optimism this has brought, the situation is not expected to change any time soon.
In the Belgian region of Flanders, the Flemish youth council (Vlaamse Jeugdraad, or VJR) and Flemish youth work in general is under attack from the extreme right-wing party Vlaams Belang, which is threatening to slash funding to youth projects that it considers to be “extreme left-wing propaganda in disguise”.
Youth councils are not the only ones
The situation faced by many youth councils mirrors the way in which the interests and needs of young people are regarded in society. The same is true for youth work more generally. In some European countries, youth policy is inconsistent or even wholly inexistent, with a lack of means-tested financial resources for youth work activities and insufficient training for youth workers. Youth centres, youth social work providers and support programmes for young refugees are often entirely reliant on volunteers and donations. Youth work is often regarded as a “nice-to-have”, which can be slashed at all levels all too quickly. This also affects structures and services that contribute towards youth work, such as youth information centres. Finally, there may be political interference. A particularly drastic example is Georgia, where employees of the European advisory network Eurodesk were fired from one day to the next, apparently because the government plans to submit the national arm of the EU-cofinanced network to more stringent state supervision in future.
Over and above these political interventions, the spaces available to young people are limited by conflict and geopolitical crisis. One example of the resilience shown by young people under the most adverse of circumstances is the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, which was chosen to be this year’s European Youth Capital despite being ravaged by war and martial law. Young people designed the programme themselves to be enjoyed by youth groups from across the country. The municipal administration of Lviv is supportive of their work and has provided sufficient resources – a sign of their trust in the young organisers’ skills. It’s an example that demonstrates that even under exceptionally difficult circumstances, young people are still able to make the most of a bad situation and be agents of change. This requires political backing and a suitable infrastructure. It also means that organisations that serve young people in a political environment with no such backing or clear political commitment on the part of the state can only continue to operate with correspondingly greater effort. Yet in challenging political situations, their work is an essential pillar of democratic resilience and social participation.
[1] The proposed amendment to Turkey’s criminal code foresees prison sentences of between three and seven years for individuals or organisations that allegedly act on behalf of a foreign government or in the interest of a foreign organisation. Critics are concerned that the amendment could also be used to target civil society organisations that receive some of their funding from abroad.
[2] According to Georgia’s act on “transparency of foreign influence”, media and NGOs whose budgets comprise 20% or more in foreign funding must register with the authorities. Their file will then state that they work “in pursuit of interests of foreign powers“. The act gives power to the ministries of justice and finance to request information about NGOs and individuals that work with them without requiring a court order beforehand.
This article first appeared in the specialist magazine beyond. You can order, download or browse through issue 01|2025 free of charge.
