The Youth Democracy Cohort is proud to present the Menu of Possible Commitments meant to help prioritize, facilitate, and enhance youth civic and political participation. These 33 actionable and specific recommendations are provided as a set of policy options for participating governments in the Summit for Democracy – as well as other interested governments or international institutions – to choose from to adopt as commitments, reforms, and initiatives to improve youth rights and participation in their national contexts.

The possible commitments include several thematic focus areas, namely: prioritizing youth in governance, supporting youth in government, supporting youth freedom of expression, promoting a culture of youth political participation, and promoting a culture of human rights amongst youth. The diversity of focus areas reflects the current state of youth political and civic engagement, because, far from being a niche issue, young people’s disengagement from democracy is a cross-cutting problem that affects all levels of political and civic engagement.

These model commitments were put together through a consultative process involving democracy support organisations, youth representatives and youth-focussed organisations from all continents. As such, the Menu of Possible Commitments also includes commitments concerning the broader context of human rights and democracy, which were raised by youth representatives as being crucial to creating an enabling environment in which young citizens – especially girls and young women – can thrive and safely participate in democratic processes.