The Nordic member cities consider young people to be important stakeholders in our societies who deserve to be heard and empowered. Embracing young people’s experiences and perspectives is crucial if we are to create inclusive and safe cities where they want to live, study and work.

Safeguarding and Empowering Youth

Nordic cities report that one of the main issues affecting young people today is a lack of social inclusion and belonging. Young people grapple with questions of identity, belief, the future, and trying to find a likeminded community where they feel a sense of belonging. In this confusing and vulnerable state, youths are more susceptible to harmful influences and prime targets for radicalisation and recruitment by extremist movements. Not all young people have the capacity and resources to withstand the hate and propaganda that is widely shared online, and this can impact their way of viewing the world and lead to tension and prejudices towards certain groups. It is therefore crucial to include the protection and empowerment of young people when governmental leaders and cities talk about the importance of promoting democratic values and social cohesion.

Young people are often more optimistic and see opportunities where adults and people of power see insurmountable challenges. Youth around the world proved exactly that by leading by example in the fight against climate change in the past year. The question is not whether young people have any interest in participating in decision-making, but rather for cities to listen and provide spaces where they can share experiences, develop ideas, and create strong relationships with civil society and the city.

Our Safe City Action

Strengthening youth engagement

Many of our member cities are already highly skilled, experienced and deeply committed to letting local youth lead the way towards safer cities. Cities know that young people can play a key role when it comes to developing the ideas and innovations that can help prevent their peers falling prey to extremism.

Here’s how member cities are using Nordic Safe Cities to strengthen their youth engagement:

The Danish city of Esbjerg is strengthening its youth crime and gang recruitment prevention efforts and supporting local high-risk youths on their path to secure  leisure activities, job and education opportunities​. Stockholm (SE) is empowering local youths to promote inclusion, and the Norwegian city of Haugesund is reinforcing their action plan to reach young people with a special focus on vulnerable youths at risk of exclusion.

The Norwegian city of Larvik is implementing the next phase of its youth engagement strategy, KomINN, to empower youth and to create local youth ambassadors. The capital city of Oslo (NO) will take action on the outreach work towards youth to prevent hate crime, while Sarpsborg (NO) will work on a new action plan against hate speech and violent extremism that includes the youth.

In Nordic Safe Cities, youth engagement has been a key focus for the past four years. Through the concept ‘All’IN’, we engage and train young people to develop ideas that contribute to a cool and safe city for all. In the coming years, Nordic Safe Cities will set out to find new ways to create youth peer-to-peer actions, and we hope to reach 10,000 young people across our member cities by 2022. In collaboration with these young people, we want to create and share new ideas to make safer cities for youth and help train local youth to be the change-makers for inclusion in their communities.