Across Europe, societies are navigating a period of profound change. The European Union (EU), as an enduring project aiming at peace and shared prosperity, is itself being reshaped by an increasingly interdependent world. At the same time, growing geopolitical tensions, renewed security concerns, profound changes in the media and digital landscape, environmental pressures, and increasing social fragmentation are redefining both Europe's place in the world and the dynamics within its own societies.

The challenge before Europe is not simply to navigate a rapidly changing world but to shape collectively the kind of society it seeks to become. This requires strengthening Europe's capacity to respond to challenges while advancing positive aspirations such as strengthening civic life, fostering social cohesion, overcoming polarisation and radicalization, and ensuring that every person feels a sense of belonging and inclusion.

The realization of such a vision will depend on more than effective policies and resilient institutions. It will require growing numbers of people to see themselves not only as beneficiaries of a shared project, but as active contributors to its continued advancement. Central to this endeavor will be Europe's younger generations. How they come to understand their role in society—and whether the conditions exist for them to act on that understanding—will have profound implications for the continent's future.

The development of a new EU Youth Strategy therefore presents an important opportunity: the chance not simply to set priorities or expand programmes, but to invite a more fundamental reflection on the future Europe seeks to build and the role that young people are called to play in its advancement. Such a reflection necessarily entails revisiting some of the assumptions that have long shaped youth policy, beginning with who young people are, what they are capable of, and what their relationship to society and Europe’s future might become.

Recognizing youth as protagonists – A foundational conviction

Any strategy related to youth must be underpinned by a conviction: that young people should be protagonists in the process of social change. Taking this conviction seriously requires a reconsideration of many of the assumptions that continue to shape policy.

At this stage of life, capacities for learning and meaningful contribution to society begin to take shape, while a profound concern for justice and the well-being of society finds increasing expression. This commitment is not merely an aspiration to be pursued—it reflects a truth about this stage of life already manifest in youth across Europe and around the world. When these capacities are nurtured, young people become protagonists in a process of learning and collective action through which society advances.

For youth to realize this potential, other social actors — institutions, communities, educators, and policymakers—need to see them in this light and demonstrate confidence in their capacity to contribute meaningfully to society. Youth themselves also need to recognize this potential and come to see themselves as capable of reimagining both their own lives and the society they inhabit. If adequately supported and encouraged, this capacity enables them to become active protagonists of change, not simply passive bystanders in a world they will inherit. It is during this crucial stage of life, one of great opportunity and great challenge, that European policymakers have a unique responsibility to cultivate the conditions in which young people can help shape the advancement of society. 

This conviction carries important implications for the design and implementation of the EU Youth Strategy. Recognizing young people as protagonists could serve as a guiding lens through which the EU Youth Strategy assesses its priorities and implementation. This would invite a movement beyond approaches that simply assess the impact of policies on young people or seek to ensure that their voices are heard. Instead, it would ask whether young people are helping to shape the processes through which policies are conceived, developed, and refined, and whether their contribution is reshaping how policies are conceived, how different social actors collaborate, and how institutions learn. Periodic reviews involving Member States, European institutions, civil society, and young people themselves could examine these questions together, enabling the Strategy to evolve through an ongoing process of learning. Such a process would require both honesty and humility, ensuring that the Strategy remains responsive to the capacities, insights, and contributions that young people continue to bring to Europe's advancement.

An expanded understanding of participation

Important as are such participative approaches to the development of the Strategy, Europe's aspirations call for far more than the involvement of a relatively small number of young people. They require enabling growing numbers of youth to contribute to the advancement of their communities and society. Such a shift calls for a broader conception of what it means for young people to participate in the life of society. Much attention has been given to increasing the participation of youth in institutional and political processes. While important, this understanding of participation cannot, by itself, draw on the full range of capacities and aspirations present among Europe's 73 million young people. If these aspirations are to be realized, opportunities for meaningful contribution must ultimately become accessible to all. The aim is therefore broader: to create the conditions in which every young person is able to contribute meaningfully to the advancement of their communities and society—whether by creating new forms of social and economic activity that respond to emerging needs and serve the common good, contributing to public discourse, leading initiatives that address local challenges, bringing neighbours together around a shared purpose, helping newcomers feel they belong, or mentoring younger ones. This requires a movement from approaches that engage a limited number of individuals toward those that seek to release the contributions of whole populations.

This vision is possible because it builds on an impulse already present within young people themselves. When they are surrounded by an environment that places trust and confidence in their capacities, youth become animated by a twofold purpose: to develop their own capabilities while contributing to the well-being of society. This desire to contribute to social advancement is confined neither to particular social backgrounds nor to particular material circumstances. The experience of the Bahá’í communities across the continent in working with young people has shown that, when supported and encouraged, young people respond to the needs around them through acts of service, local initiatives, and collective action. Often long before formal processes invite their contributions, they are generating not only tangible improvements in community life but also insights into the conditions that foster social progress.

This broader understanding also reshapes how Europe thinks about young people who are often described as being on its margins. Whether living in rural areas, border regions, or circumstances of social exclusion, young people should not be viewed primarily through a lens of vulnerability. Rather, the challenge before institutions is to recognize their capacity to contribute and to create environments in which that capacity can increasingly find expression.

Such a conception of participation carries important implications. If the contributions of all young people are to be realized, every community will need spaces in which they can identify needs, undertake acts of service, assume responsibility, and learn together through action. Beyond articulating common priorities at the European level, the Strategy could encourage Member States and local authorities to develop locally rooted visions for how every young person might progressively contribute to the advancement of society, drawing on local realities while remaining connected to the broader aspirations of the European project. 

Such a process would invite local communities to move beyond asking how more youth can participate in existing initiatives toward asking how the capacities of every young person might find meaningful expression in the life of their community. Existing structures—from youth councils and schools to municipalities, community organizations, and other local actors—could then consider how their programmes and activities might increasingly serve that objective. Institutions, in turn, would need to strengthen their capacity to learn from these experiences, allowing insights generated through local action to continually inform policy and practice. Participation thus becomes more than consultation or formal inclusion in decision-making processes. It becomes an ongoing process of collective learning through which young people, communities, and institutions together contribute to the advancement of society.

Creating conditions that release the capacity of youth

Realizing the potential of young people to contribute meaningfully to society depends not only on their capacities, but also on the conditions that enable those capacities to find expression. Two conditions are especially important.

Broadening the role and purpose of education

Recognizing young people as protagonists requires more than conviction alone. It also calls for educational processes that build the capacities needed to translate the aspirations of youth into meaningful action.

Narrow conceptions of education can create barriers that limit a young person's capacity to flourish and contribute to society. When education is reduced to the assimilation of information or the acquisition of skills for competition in the labor market, learning can become a ladder to be climbed faster than others, creating pressures and incentives that stifle, rather than cultivate, the love of knowledge that sustains a fulfilling educational journey.

If young people are to become protagonists of societal renewal, education must inspire them to direct their talents not only towards personal advancement but also towards the betterment of society. The experience of the Bahá'í community has shown the transformative power of educational processes that enable youth to translate moral and ethical principles into action, cultivating their ability to analyze society and its possibilities, assume responsibility for its well-being, and combine study with practical acts of service. Such processes do more than develop agency, they also provide the moral orientation that enables young people to direct that agency towards the advancement of the common good.

Central to this orientation is the recognition of humanity's oneness—the understanding that humanity shares a common future and that the well-being of every person is inseparable from the well-being of all. Beyond an ethical aspiration, it offers a lens through which to understand society, recognizing diversity not as a source of division but as a strength that enriches the whole. It invites young people to examine whether their actions contribute to relationships characterized by trust, reciprocity, justice, and shared responsibility, or whether they reinforce patterns of exclusion, prejudice, and fragmentation. In this sense, education endows young people with the capacities needed to contribute to society and provides a vision for directing those capacities towards the building of societal unity. Such education equips them to resist forces that would define their identities according to narrow interests or encourage an inward-looking view of their own lives, while strengthening their confidence in the kind of individuals they can become—and the kind of society they can help to build.

This objective calls for a sustained process of learning across Europe about the characteristics of educational processes that truly empower young people and cultivate this sense of oneness It invites educators, communities, policymakers, and young people themselves to explore how curricula, pedagogies, and learning environments can develop knowledge and skills alongside the dispositions, values, and habits of thought needed to contribute to the building of societal unity. The European Union could support this process by convening an ongoing dialogue among Member States, educators, researchers, civil society, and young people to examine the educational principles and approaches that most effectively cultivate these capacities, allowing the resulting insights to progressively inform both formal and non-formal education.

Cultivating environments that sustain purpose

Empowering educational processes cannot be considered in isolation from the wider social environment in which young people live. The assumptions these environments reinforce and the social relations they shape also influence how young people understand both their purpose and their relationship to society.

Across the educational, social, civic, and media environments that shape young people's lives, prevailing assumptions can reinforce a distorted understanding of who they are and their role in society—for example, as consumers, audiences, or periodic participants in democratic life—rather than as irreplaceable protagonists in society's advancement. If Europe's aspirations for the role of youth are to be realized, it will be essential to cultivate greater coherence across these environments, so that this broader understanding of young people is consistently reinforced through the experiences, relationships, and opportunities that shape their lives.

An ongoing process of reflection and learning is therefore needed, enabling society to continually examine the values embedded in its social systems and ask whether they are consistent with both its aspirations for the future and its understanding of the role of young people in bringing about that future. 

The EU Youth Strategy could help advance this process by encouraging the EU and Member States to integrate this perspective into existing implementation and review processes, periodically examining whether the educational, civic, social, and media environments that shape young people's lives consistently reinforce the understanding of youth articulated by the Strategy. Such a process would strengthen coherence across policy areas while allowing the Strategy itself to evolve through continued learning from experience.

Societal challenges requiring the unique contribution of young people

There are virtually no challenges facing European society that would not benefit from the contribution of young people. Yet some challenges call especially for qualities and capacities that are most evident during the period of youth.

Strengthening community life and intergenerational relationships

Beyond educational settings, the local community provides one of the first and most important environments in which young people learn to contribute to the advancement of society. It is here that most will make their earliest and most immediate contributions to the well-being of those around them, acquiring the experience, capacities, and attitudes that will equip them for responsibilities of increasing scope throughout their lives. In local communities the connection between diverse individuals and families through relationships of mutual support, trust, and service to one another provides a particularly fertile environment for this process to unfold.

Intergenerational relationships are a defining feature of vibrant community life. They create spaces in which wisdom, experience, energy, and new insight circulate across generations, enabling each generation both to contribute to and to be strengthened by the others. Older members of a community offer advice, encouragement, and wisdom while recognizing youth as capable protagonists whose ideas deserve to be embraced with openness. As young people begin to assume responsibility for the social, intellectual, and moral development of younger generations, their own sense of purpose and agency deepens. Strengthening these reciprocal relationships will require a reimagining of the social relations at the heart of European society and a collective process of learning through which local communities are strengthened and the growing fragmentation between generations is overcome.

Building societal unity

Europe's rich cultural, ethnic, and religious diversity is one of its greatest strengths, but its promise depends on every population feeling that it belongs and can contribute to the continent's future. Such belonging cannot be secured through coexistence alone. Prejudice persists where individuals merely live alongside one another without opportunities for meaningful interaction.

Young people are especially well placed to build these relationships. Less constrained by inherited patterns of division, they often demonstrate a readiness to see beyond distinctions of culture, ethnicity, or religion and to relate to others as members of one human family. In doing so, they forge bonds of friendship and collaboration across different individuals and groups, creating spaces in which people can work together in service to their communities, allowing trust, a shared sense of purpose, and genuine belonging gradually to emerge.

The Strategy could support this role by ensuring that youth are not only consulted on policies that seek to strengthen social cohesion, but are entrusted with responsibility for designing, implementing, and learning from specific lines of action—for example, within the EU Anti-racism Strategy, social cohesion strategies, or other initiatives that address polarisation and exclusion.

Reimagining society's relationship with media and technology

Media and technology have become the principal infrastructure through which people communicate, learn, and organize their collective life. Because they increasingly shape human relationships and social structures, the values embedded in their design and use profoundly influence the direction of society itself.

Media and technology are never value-neutral. Every technological system reflects assumptions about human beings, the nature of progress, and the kinds of relationships it seeks to encourage. Yet these assumptions often remain implicit. As a result, technological innovation can reinforce priorities shaped more by market incentives—such as efficiency, convenience, and immediate gratification—than by a conscious reflection on the values that should guide the advancement of society. This leads to challenges that are fundamentally social, moral, or educational being approached primarily through technical solutions, rather than through processes that cultivate human capacity.

Reversing this trend requires more than better regulation or more responsible use. It calls for a sustained dialogue among policymakers, technology developers, educators, civil society, and young people about the purposes technological development should serve and the values that should guide it in contributing to the advancement of society. Young people have a distinctive contribution to make to this conversation. At a stage of life in which enduring convictions about justice and the well-being of society are taking shape—and in which media and technology play an increasingly formative role in shaping identity, relationships, and participation—they are especially well placed to help shape how media and technology evolve so that they better reflect those values and contribute to the kind of society Europe seeks to build.

Shaping multilateral systems grounded in the oneness of humanity

Some of the defining challenges of our age transcend national borders. Addressing them will require not only stronger multilateral cooperation, but also the gradual emergence of new forms of interaction, governance, and collaboration capable of advancing the well-being of humanity as a whole. Helping to shape such systems is among the great tasks before future generations. Many young people already demonstrate the beginnings of the vision this task requires. Their concern for crises and injustices far beyond the boundaries of their own countries reflects a sense of justice that stops at no border and an aspiration to contribute to the advancement of society that extends beyond their own communities or nations.

If young people are to contribute to reshaping multilateral systems, they will need to help ensure that those systems increasingly reflect the well-being of humanity as a whole. They must be founded on a recognition that humanity shares a common future and that the prosperity of every people is inseparable from the prosperity of all. Cultivating in young people this consciousness of humanity's oneness—a deep sense of belonging to a single human family and of responsibility for its collective well-being—is therefore indispensable. Without such a foundation, even well-intentioned efforts to empower youth will struggle to generate the forms of enduring societal transformation needed to respond to challenges that no nation can resolve alone.

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Every generation inherits the responsibility to advance society beyond its current state. As Europe considers the next chapter of its Youth Strategy, it has an opportunity to cultivate the conditions in which every young person, without exception, can realize their capacity to contribute to this shared task.