Project
Youth Training for Democracy and Development
- Guatemala
- May 2012
The overall objective of the project was to strengthen the participation of young people in Guatemala through training to create a base of young leaders from indigenous communities living in the Department of Alta Verapaz. The project strategy revolved around four priority components: developing the competencies of young leaders to improve their ability to assume responsibility in their communities; promoting knowledge about current legislation to foster rule of law, governance, and democracy; improving the quality of the dialogue between youth and local government to consolidate opportunities for participation; and encouraging youth to become more involved and influential in local decision-making bodies to help meet the basic needs of their communities.
The approach was consistent with the grantee’s strategic goal of providing young people training in participatory civic practices, and enabling them to approach and develop responses to the problems and needs of youth in rural indigenous communities. In addition, the project’s cost-benefit ratio was positive: there was very high participation in terms of the number of benefiting communities and the number of young people completing the project’s training.
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- Youth engagement
- Guatemala
- May 2012
By awakening participants to the concept of gender equality, the project helped change perceptions about the place of young women in communities, thus improving young women’s access to basic services and fostering their participation in social and political life. This could represent the foundation for a new culture of civic equality
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- Youth engagement
- Guatemala
- May 2012
By providing training in participatory civic practices in Guatemala, the project gave youth the opportunity to adopt different attitudes and experience democracy and development differently. Young people’s participation in decision-making bodies has helped improve the situation of vulnerable indigenous communities in this region.
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- Youth engagement
- Guatemala
- May 2012
The collective assessments conducted in Guatemala through local situation analysis, as well as the preparation of proposals for alternative projects, has motivated the local population to become more directly involved in the local management of development. A substantial number of young beneficiaries have joined the Municipal Development Councils, the bodies responsible for decision-making and municipal policy development, and other institutions such as the Municipal Bureaus and mayoralties.
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- Youth engagement
- Guatemala
- May 2012
The project sought to strengthen democratization processes in rural areas focusing by on regions with a fragile social fabric and weak civil society. In this respect the multiplication of training opportunities provided by programme graduates through their activities in their communities, further enhanced the project’s effectiveness.
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- Youth engagement
- Guatemala
- May 2012
A factor that contributed to the project’s effectiveness was the way that the conceptual and practical elements of the training were complementary. This enabled the youth in the indigenous communities to combine a critical analysis of the local situation with the implementation of practical alternatives.