Youth as a political force: new proposals for the European Youth Year

The presence of youth in policy-making in Europe continues to be the main demand of the European Movement for the Conference on the Future of Europe (CoFoE), and other organisations such as UGT and Comisiones Obreras have joined this conviction, taking advantage of the fact that 2022 is the European Year of Youth because, according to these sources, "young people have a very important task this year".

These proposals were redefined at the International Conference "From the Porto Declaration to the European Year of Youth", organised by the European Movement and the Ugetist Revolution (RUGE). Representatives of these organisations highlighted the main problems facing young people today and those they will face in the very near future "if no action is taken", they said.

Unfair working conditions, unpaid or underpaid internships, youth unemployment and emancipation problems were the main issues that were portrayed on the day. Although the young people mentioned programmes that helped to advance in these aspects, such as the Alma programme, Erasmus or the Youth Guarantee, they continued to demand more representation and tools to tackle these problems. 

This is why they mentioned the social needs to be covered in the European Year of Youth, that "social policy has to be the central axis" and that "Europe has to be aware of the role of trade unions". In this sense, Adrià Junyent, the CCOO youth leader, mentioned that this work is also to "prevent disaffection with the European institutions from growing".

Moreover, these demands were not isolated to current affairs. The young people strongly denounced Russia's invasion of Ukraine and stressed the role of the EU-27 in the face of this war. "The European Union has shown the importance of all of us working together, and this is the way it has to be with Ukraine", said Juan Enrique Gallo, member of the Spanish Youth Council. They also took the opportunity to highlight the consequences that will be experienced in Europe in the coming months if action is not also taken by young people. "Europe is moving forward with a crisis", announced Irene Pérez Regueiro, collaborator in the European Movement, alluding to the need for the CoFoE to be able to react.

One of the most awaited interventions was that of the president of the European Movement in Spain, Francisco Aldecoa, who argued the importance of this day due to the aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, the moment of transformation and redefinition of the European political project and because the European Year of Youth will be celebrated in 2022. "This meeting has to be the beginning of a new stage in which youth is represented as a political force", announced Aldecoa.

The president of the European Movement argued that the Confederation on the Future of Europe "is not working well" and that there needs to be more dialogue between the European institutions and youth movements in Spain. "The European Movement takes the Year of Youth very seriously," Aldecoa said, alluding to the opportunity for youth to defend their presence in the rule of law, social policy, economy and foreign policy and Defence. "The political cycle changed in 2019 thanks to the youth vote, and thanks to that, Europeanism is getting stronger and stronger. Young people have a huge responsibility and it is up to the European Movement to give you the possibility to participate in these aspects of Europe," he said.

Finally, the spokesperson for Revolución Ugetista, Eduardo Magaldi, also spoke, as the organiser of this day. Precariousness in the world of work for European youth was the main concern of the speaker, in addition to other challenges, he said, "which must be faced, such as environmentalism, climate change, digitalisation and the fight against the extreme right". Eduardo Magaldi proposed that in order to do so, "the EU had to be reconfigured and work to give a greater voice to young people".

And to close the cycle, Cristina Antoñanzas, the deputy general secretary of UGT, was in charge of closing the day, where she took the opportunity to encourage all young people to "fight and be much more revolutionary" to achieve the proposed demands. "We must take advantage of these platforms to achieve our challenges in Europe", she concluded to end the event.