The CATCH-EyoU project aims to identify ways and means by which we can help cultivate a new generation of young European citizens, in a complex historical period, characterized by unprecedented challenges to the EU political project (e.g. UK vote to exit from the EU, growth of populist and racism movements). It is a context in which a strong and cohesive EU would be urgently needed in order to address emerging social and political issues that member states are struggling to address on their own (e.g. refugee crisis, economic crisis, youth unemployment, increasing inequalities, radicalization).
The current generation of European youth was born in the EU; however, the extent to which the EU is a real and concrete entity in their everyday life experience and awareness is still not clear. What does being member of the EU mean to youth? How do young people engage as active citizens in EU issues?
Clarifying the meanings and significance of active EU citizenship, beyond the “normative” existing conceptualizations that inform policy and educational efforts, seems necessary in order to build a different, more inclusive and equitable EU, towards the variety of its different citizens, including those ones who currently resist or oppose it.
Through a consortium of nine partners from eight European countries, (Coordinator University of Bologna, Italy), representing different disciplines(Psychology, Political Science, Sociology, Media and Communications, Education, History)the CATCH-EyoU project addressed the nature and processes of construction of active citizenship among European youth, including an analysis of the multifaceted factors influencing young people perspectives toward the EU, their sense of EU identity and membership and the different forms of youth active engagement in European politics at various governance levels. It aimed to offer policy makers, professionals and young people themselves new “conceptual lenses” and instruments to better understand the factors that decide how the EU can be brought closer to its young citizens. These aims have been addressed through a multi-methodological approach, and including young people as partners, in order to ensure that youth’s own perspectives and concerns are fully incorporated.
Project activities were implemented as planned and allowed to identify the complexity of the factors and processes that, at different levels(macrosocial/societal, contextual/interactional,individual psychological) explain the forms and profiles of youth engagement in the context of the EU.
