Search for Common Ground (Search) Lebanon and Jordan are jointly implementing the Piloting Youth Platforms in Lebanon and Jordan project. The project aims at empowering youth in Lebanon and Jordan to utilize and govern online and in-person youth platforms as a means of collaboratively tackling issues impacting youth. The platform could be used by youth to share their thoughts, grievances, meet and interact with one another, be active in their communities, collaborate on a wide range of social, civic, political, and economic issues, and connect with local authorities and community leaders. To do so the project seeks to: 1) To provide selected active and engaged youth with tailored, relevant platforms to meet, coordinate, and empower one another, and 2) to increase institutional understanding of how to best design and implement collaborative and participatory youth platforms.
CONTEXT
Jordan and Lebanon have large youth populations, despite the significant sizes of these demographics, youth in both countries continue to face multiple challenges in engaging meaningfully in society, and as such share common concerns around education, employment, and their active citizenship. Young people have limited opportunities to make their voices heard and lack representation in political processes at the local and national levels. This further increases youth marginalization from society, and political and civic life and acts as a barrier towards them becoming leaders in their communities. Additionally, youth suffer from a lack of infrastructure and support in both Jordan and Lebanon, preventing their active engagement with their peers, communities, and local authorities. There are no youth-related communication or dialogue platforms where local governance actors and young people can interact, or where young people can perform outreach to their peers. In both countries, youth are expressing fatigue at the lack of engagement with local authorities, who continue to respond inadequately to their needs.
THE APPROACH
Given the lack of infrastructure for youth to connect with their peers, communities, and local authorities, Search for Common Ground (Search) has identified the need to conduct a participatory youth platform design process that engages youth directly to understand their specific needs. The platforms, in line with this strategy, will enable young women and young men to independently develop multi-dimensional identities based on equal opportunities and will boost the agency of young people to use their voices to promote collaboration through issue-based youth-led action.
IF target young leaders in Jordan and Lebanon are provided with the skills and resources to set up and govern online and in-person tailored youth platforms AND IF the efficacy of these platforms are closely monitored and evaluated, and lessons learned and adaptation captured, THEN target youth will be better equipped to sustainably and collectively tackle issues impacting them and their peers BECAUSE best practices for youth platforms (whether online, in-person or a combination of the two) will be better understood by Search and applied to future youth-centered programming.
EXPECTED CHANGE
- Create an enduring shift in attitudes among youth and other key stakeholders to ensure collaborative conflict management on issues impacting youth enhanced engagement by youth in civic and decision-making spaces, and the promotion of localized youth platforms.
- Enhancing social cohesion in the target locations, specifically by increasing the involvement of diverse youth and ensuring inclusive participation of young women and men, thereby amplifying the voices of diverse young leaders in their communities.
- Local youth leaders will have durable skills, competencies, and increased capacity to work together and implement concrete collaborative actions in their communities.
- Youth will be better equipped to sustainably and collectively tackle issues impacting them and their peers through documenting the best practices and ensuring that direct learnings and recommendations from the project will be made available to inform future programming.
- Youth will govern their platforms and utilize them to resolve local conflicts, issues, and disputes and respond to their needs in terms of participation and collaboration independently.
Snapshots & Success Stories
4-day Training: The Common Ground Approach and a Collaborative Design Workshop
Jordan and Lebanon have large youth populations, and despite the significant size of these demographics, youth in both countries face challenges as they seek to engage meaningfully in society. Concerns regarding education, employment, and active citizenship are common. Young people have limited opportunities to make their voices heard and lack representation in both local and national political processes. This disenfranchisement further marginalizes youth, and political and civic barriers prevent them from becoming leaders within their communities. Additionally, youth suffer from a lack of infrastructure and support in both Jordan and Lebanon, which prevents active engagement with their peers, communities, and local authorities. There are no youth-related communication or dialogue platforms young people can access to connect with their peers.
2-day Training: Capacity Building
Following the enthusiasm generated by the Piloting Youth Platforms’ four-day training on The Common Ground Approach and Collaborative Design Workshop, Search for Common Ground (Search) facilitated an interactive two-day capacity-building workshop for youth leaders across Lebanon. In total four topics, identified by youth as particularly important, were covered over a series of sessions, including an introduction to mental health awareness, monitoring and evaluation, media and communications, and finance and budgeting.
2-day Workshop: Introduction to Social Roles and Community Initiative Development
Eager to learn more, youth leaders in Search’s Piloting Youth Platforms project participated in a two-day workshop that built youth’s understanding of social dynamics and facilitated community initiative ideation.
Read the Communication Close-out Report here
