Youth policy promotes participation and creates prospects

Project description

Title: Politics for and political participation of youth in Tunisia
Commissioned by: German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)
Country: Tunisia
Lead executing agency: Ministère de la Jeunesse et des Sports Tunisien;  Tunisian Ministry of Youth and Sports
Overall term: 2019 to 2022

Context

Since the revolution, that took place between 2010 and 2011, young people in Tunisia have been hoping for better opportunities. For many of them, these hopes have not yet been fulfilled. So far, national youth policies have not provided satisfactory answers to demands for economic, social and political participation. This has provided a breeding ground for risk behaviour among young people, such as drug use, religious radicalisation and illegal migration.

The Tunisian Ministry of Youth and Sports addresses these challenges in a political vision and provides solutions aimed at the target group through a network of around 350 youth centres.

Thanks to previous projects in Tunisia, an important basis for promoting young people’s participation in social, economic and political affairs has been established on which the new project can build.

Objective

The Ministry of Youth and Sports ensures that young people’s interests are taken into account in the government’s youth policy strategy and implements this strategy through decentralised structures. 

Approach 

The project has a special focus on promoting youth centres as places for social participation and raising careers awareness. The youth centres receive support in developing educational strategies and tools for careers guidance and the prevention of risk behaviour. All measures are designed as spaces for discovery and experience so that the principle of participation can be experienced directly. The results of the work at the youth centres are incorporated into the national youth policy strategy.

Long-term capacity building enables various actors to implement the Ministry of Youth’s strategy. Key actors include entertainers, youth centre directors and youth workers.

The youth centres get local actors involved to offer young people a wider range of activities. As a result, young women and men can take their future careers into their own hands while accessing support and advice in the right places. 

To meet the structural requirements for new youth work concepts, the youth centres are also being fitted out and partially renovated. Young people can get involved in the renovation work, giving them some initial careers awareness.