Youth engagement in the internet governance community has been growing over the years, becoming an inherent part of each Internet Governance Forum. That has resulted in the creation of many movements and organisations all over the world encouraging young people to get involved in the discussion on the most urgent IGF topics.

In this session, we would like to put in the spotlight youth initiatives whose activity and achievements deserve special recognition. Their members have been working on various projects aiming to improve different areas of Internet governance. During this event, we would like to show how much power the youth voice can have.

YouthxPolicymakers

In preparation for IGF 2021, the YouthxPolicyMakers program brought together young people and policy makers to discuss a range of internet governance topics. In the course of four thematic roundtables, participants had the opportunity to meet parliamentarians, government officials and policy shapers from the private sector, asking them questions and advocating for their stances on pressing issues such as inclusivity, accessibility, content regulation, and cybersecurity. Ahead of the roundtables, preparatory workshops on specific topics within Internet governance were held, which featured talks on effective advocacy work and youth participation. Besides learning from experts, participants benefit from each other’s expertise and work together to formulate policy recommendations or advocacy strategies.

Digital Youth Jam by ITU Generation Connect

The ITU Generation Connect Europe Youth Group is organizing the Digital Youth Jam on 3 December 2021. It aims to gather European youth leaders and organizations to debate the role of youth organizations in policymaking and their contribution to engaging and leading youth in Europe. In addition, the GC-EUR Youth Declaration drafted and presented in early 2021 will be discussed. This event will also serve as another step towards the journey of GC-EUR to the World Telecommunication Development Conference (WTDC) to be held in June 2022 and the European Year of Youth 2022.

The event outcomes on the power, challenges and opportunities that Digital represents, will be shared in a short presentation with the ability for youth present to give their views on the identified points.

Internet Society Youth SIG

Internet Society Youth SIG promotes policy dialogue among youths on issues of Internet governance bringing together all stakeholders in the Internet governance debate on an equal basis and through an open and inclusive process. It empowers organizations and individual members to obtain the skills, knowledge, tools and resources needed to contribute effectively to internet governance and policy in their region and globally. During the session, Internet Society Youth SIG will present its youth-oriented programmes.

Youth Coalition on Internet Governance

The Youth Coalition on Internet Governance (YCIG) is an open group for organizations and individuals, representing all stakeholder groups, willing to collaborate together in order to encourage and enrich youth participation in local, regional, and international Internet governance discussions and processes. The YCIG was established to advocate for the voice of children, young people, and young professionals in Internet governance fora and processes, particularly at the annual Internet Governance Forum (IGF). The YCIG is the natural space for youth interested in Internet governance-related issues and the IGF as a platform for engaging with all stakeholders on equal footing to amplify youth voices.

1) Online participants will be an important part of the audience as a lot of members of presented projects and initiatives would not be able to come to IGF in Katowice in person. Therefore, online and onsite moderators will cooperate to ensure that both online and onsite participants will have an equal opportunity to join the discussion with speakers and to ask them questions. 2) Some organisers and speakers will be onsite. 3) For now, it is not planned to use any additional tools or platforms.