On May 19-21, 2008, the United Nations Programme on Youth organized an Expert Group Meeting on Youth at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. The purpose of the meeting was to develop goals and targets for the priority areas in the World Programme of Action for Youth. The meeting gathered representatives from UN agencies, academia, governments, NGOs and youth organizations.

Why does the UN organize Expert Group Meetings?
The UN is a place where governments come together to discuss and make recommendations and decisions on issues that are affecting the world. The UN Secretariat, a substantial part of the UN system, helps to plan and prepare for meetings, and to follow up with technical advice and monitoring of the recommendations governments make at the UN. Governments also often ask the UN Secretariat to look deeper into an issue and to prepare reports and recommendations that governments can discuss and negotiate.

When the UN Secretariat is tasked with this process, their goal is to produce a comprehensive report that is balanced, well researched, and inclusive, and that also contains recommendations for actions that governments can use as a baseline for negotiations. These reports are often referred to as “Secretary General’s report on…”, although the SG himself of course does not write all of them. But to the point, the UN Secretariat staff, although usually very knowledgeable, do not have all the expertise and experience needed to look comprehensively at all the issues being discussed. Therefore, they organize Expert Group Meetings in order to gather experts on an issue for a 2-3 day discussion on what the report should focus on. Researchers, professors, statisticians, field workers, NGO representatives and more come together to share opinions and experiences, and the UN Secretariat tries to capture all this and put it into the report which is then sent over the governments to consider.

Why was the Expert Group Meeting on Youth organized?
The background document of the meeting was the World Programme of Action for Youth. This document was adopted by governments in 1995 and lays out 10 priority areas (Education, Employment, Hunger and poverty, Health, Environment, Drug abuse, Juvenile delinquency, Leisure-time activities, Girls and young women, and Participation) for governments to focus on for youth development. In the World Youth Report 2003, an additional 5 areas were proposed (Globalization, Information and Communication Technologies, HIV/AIDS, Youth and Conflict, Intergenerational Relations), and these were adopted by the General Assembly in 2005.

The 15 priority areas are commitments and guidelines for governments to improve the situation for young people in their countries. However, it can be very hard to determine whether progress is actually being made. Consider the passage below, which is taken from the Participation section of WPAY:

Proposals for action

107. The following actions are proposed:

• a) Improving access to information in order to enable young people to make better use of their opportunities to participate in decision-making;
• (b) Developing and/or strengthening opportunities for young people to learn their rights and responsibilities, promoting their social, political, developmental and environmental participation, removing obstacles that affect their full contribution to society and respecting, inter alia, freedom of association;
• (c) Encouraging and promoting youth associations through financial, educational and technical support and promotion of their activities;
• (d) Taking into account the contribution of youth in designing, implementing and evaluating national policies and plans affecting their concerns;
• (e) Encouraging increased national, regional and international cooperation and exchange between youth organizations;
• (f) Inviting Governments to strengthen the involvement of young people in international forums, inter alia, by considering the inclusion of youth representatives in their national delegations to the General Assembly.

As you can see there are a lot of good intentions here, but also a lot of words such as encouraging, strengthening and promoting which does not really make a firm commitment for action for governments. Any government can say it has encouraged youth participation since 1995, but how can we know that youth participation has actually increased?

In order to measure progress on youth development, governments in 2005 requested the UN Secretariat to develop goals and targets in all areas of WPAY. The idea is to have concrete numbers and deadlines that can be more easily monitored and evaluated. In 2007, the UN Program on Youth organized an Expert Group Meeting to develop goals and targets in 4 of the WPAY priority areas (Education, Employment, Poverty and Hunger, and Globalization), and a number of goals and targets were developed. This year’s meeting focused on the remaining 11 areas of WPAY and was therefore far more ambitious, since we had about the same amount of time (3 days).

How was the meeting organized?
The UN Program on Youth were in charge of all the preparations for the meeting, and they invited participants from a wide range of fields, including professors, UN staff, field workers, and representatives of youth-led and youth-supportive organizations. Unfortunately, a lack of time and funding made it difficult for young people to participate, which is a common problem in these processes. Participants had the chance to submit their suggestions before the meeting, and the European Youth Forum suggested the following goals and targets on Participation:

- Goal 1: Ensure young people’s rights to participate in decision-making on the national and international level
- Goal 2: Ensure the equal participation of girls and boys, young women and young men, in decision-making

Targets:
- The establishment of youth-led, democratic and gender equal National Youth Councils in every Member State of the UN, building upon youth civil society, within 2015.
- The establishment of youth-led and gender equal participation structures in each pilot country of the One Country – One UN Reform by 2010.
- Ensure that no country has a voting age higher than 18 and that all women and men can be elected to national assemblies from the age of 18 by 2015.

Compared to the original text on Participation in WPAY, this is a lot more action-oriented. It also allows for youth organizations and others to hold governments accountable if the goals and targets are not achieved. However, this was just a suggestion ahead of the meeting, and there were many other suggestions and thoughts around this theme from other participants.

The meeting started with a series of presentations from experts within the 11 areas that we were discussing. The experts had also been asked to develop suggestions for goals and targets that could form the basis for discussion. It is too much to cover in one blog, and needless to say it was easy to feel overwhelmed as one important area for youth after another was covered in about 2 hours. Franziska Seel, Executive Director of GYAN, gave a presentation on Youth and ICTs where she highlighted access and content as important areas.

From United Nation...

The second day started with more presentations, and Naomi Sorkin from the Global Youth Coalition on HIV/AIDS (GYCA) presented on HIV/AIDS and highlighted that young people need access to information, health services and participation opportunities. Christoffer Grønstad from the European Youth Forum criticized the meeting process for not including enough youth organizations and for not having enough of a development focus.

On the 2nd day, I was also able to give a presentation on participation. I focused on the work Franziska Seel and TakingITGlobal has done around National Youth Councils, and presented some findings from their research report. In addition, I highlighted what I think is an important trend in youth participation – the use of technology to consult with a large and diverse number of young people on important issues. This method of participation should not at all replace traditional democratic youth networks, but it can be a very useful addition especially in countries where these structures do not yet exist.

After a lot of presentations, it was then time for discussions. The participations were divided into small groups and given the challenge to discuss the 11 issues and come up with suggestions for goals and targets. Needless to say this was a formidable task, since each issue easily could have filled a 3-day meeting. It was reflected in the discussions where we were only able to skim the surface of each issue before having to suggest the goals and targets and then moving on to the next issue.

From United Nation...

The last day we then went into a plenary discussion to try to finalize the goals and targets for each of the 11 areas. It became clear that we were not going to reach full consensus on all goals and targets, and that many of the issues needed further research and input before sensible and relevant goals. It was agreed that the UN Programme on Youth staff would be tasked with following up on this meeting and finalizing the goals and targets based on the discussion we had in the meeting. This is not an easy task, to say the least.

What was the final outcome and conclusions of the meeting?
At the time of writing this blog, the final outcome of the meeting is now yet ready. The UN staff is still working on the goals and targets, and they will now most likely be presented to the General Assembly in the fall for further discussion, negotiation and hopefully adoption. You can monitor the progress at the Expert Group Meeting on Youth website.

Overall, it was a very interesting meeting on a really short timeline. I understand the constraints the UN Programme on Youth in terms of available resources and staff, and given the circumstances they did a great job getting this meeting organized. However, the UN system as a whole really needs to pay more attention to youth issues and provide more time and resources to organize meetings like this. The meeting was often dominated by Western perspectives on youth development, and there were also not many youth organizations present.

I hope the meeting eventually does lead to the adoption of new goals and targets for youth development. Although one can argue whether development can always be quantified, it is helpful both for governments and youth organizations to have something to strive towards. The alternative is having the vague commitments of promoting and encouraging youth development.

What do you think about using goals and targets to monitor youth development?

Genocide: n. Any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. (1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 2).

On June 12th, over 150 people gathered in the United Nations’ Dag Hammarskjold Library Auditorium to listen to genocide expert David Hamburg talk about his new book, Preventing Genocide: Practical Steps Towards Early Detection and Effective Action. The event was organized by the United Nations University.

“It’s encouraging that there is so much interest in such a grim subject,” Dr. Jean-Marc Coicaud, the head of the United Nations University said while introducing Dr. Hamburg. “The fact that we have such a large crowd here is a true testament to peace.”

For the next hour, Hamburg argued against the widely held belief that genocide is inevitable and affirmed that it is indeed preventable. He explained that while much research has gone into documenting and analyzing genocides, experts have said little about prevention.

“It’s widely accepted among political leaders that genocide cannot be detected until the last minute,” Hamburg explained. “However, research shows that early signals always provide ample time for response options, provided that we have focal points for mobilizing the best practices.”

Hamburg credits United Nations’ former Secretary Generals Dag Hammarskjold for introducing the concept of genocide prevention and Kofi Annan for proving that humanitarian help can be provided quickly and efficiently. Because of these two men, Hamburg said, the United Nations has "started to get the ball rolling" in formulating a set of genocide prevention tools. Hamburg identified six tools in preventing genocide, including pro-active help in prevention of mass violence, fostering equitable socio-economic development, promoting education for human survival, and preventing human rights infractions through forms of international justice.

Yet while Hamburg applauded the UN for “setting a favorable trend” in genocide prevention, he acknowledged that there is still much room for improvement.

“Agencies can do more in prevention than they are now doing,” Hamburg said. He pointed out that United Nations genocide prevention efforts are constrained by the threat of a Security Council veto and by nations’ fear of overriding sovereignty in the General Assembly. Additionally, departments that deal with genocide prevention are usually “underfunded and understaffed.”

The book also identified patterns that can be found at the roots of genocides. Hamburg made the point that genocides usually occur when one group blames a weaker group for its own problems and cultivates intergroup hatred. If left untouched, the stronger group may incite violence that will grow over the years, from periodic outbursts, to civil war, to genocide. It’s for this reason, Hamburg says, that we need to focus on early and mid-range genocide prevention tactics and not wait until it’s too late.

Along with identifying the early steps of genocide, Hamburg called upon policy makers to create environments where genocide is less likely to occur. “A fundamental responsibility of policy makers is to …promote factors of political process in violence-prone societies,” he said.

“It’s hard to understand how decent human beings can commit genocide,” the author concluded. “If we can’t learn to live together, then all of our efforts won’t be of much value.”

Dr. Hamburg's book can be purchased here.