Youth involvement in demonstrations and riots

Estonian National Youth Council (ENL) is organizing a conference on demonstrations and riots and youth participation in those events. The conference will take place from 2nd of November till 3d of November 2010 in Tallinn. ENL is looking for participants to share experience and discuss on youth involvement on demonstrations, the values of young people, the reasons of violent demonstrations and the affect of such events.

Known activists and experts will hold exiting workshops and give interesting speeches on values, practices, demonstrations and democracy.

Experts:

• Oleg Kozlovsky (Russian democracy and human rights activist, who has been participated and organizing several demonstrations and also has been arrested. He has been supporting Ukraine's orange revolution, is a member of Amnesty International, movement Solidarnost and a Human Rights First award winner in 2008);
• Agu Uudelepp (former journalist, communications and propaganda expert and a known opinion leader in Estonia who has said that sometimes looking at very lousy and passive "demonstrations" in Estonia he feels like protesting against bad demonstrations.);
• Hector C Pagan (He has served as a Lecturer at the Institute of Government and Politics, University of Tartu since 2007. His teaching focus has been on public administration, civil society and the third sector. He holds an MA in Public and Nonprofit Administration from New York University. Before moving into academia, he worked for over ten years in New York City with government and civil society/third sector organizations in fundraising, programme design, service delivery and policy advocacy for under-served and marginalized groups including the disabled, ex-prisoners and the homeless In these roles he has practical knowledge having helped organize and participate in many public demonstrations.)
• Andris Gobins (He is on the the leading NGO activists in Latvia and has a long standing experience including different kinds of forms of social activism. He is the leader of the European Movement in Latvia and has been an important part in many peaceful demonstrations. He is also part of governmet - NGO dialog process being very knowledgeable also on the formal side of processes.)
• Denis Cenusa (A freelance expert and analyst of European Union, NATO and Moldovan policies. He has been leading several projects and programmes connected to youth involvement and civic activeness issues);
• Lilit Melkonyan (Her expertise is the freedom of speech and freedom of assembly in Armenia);
• Linnar Viik (Former Director, Skype Technologies Ltd, Associate Professor and Member of the Board, Estonian Information Technology College, IT technologies guru from Estonia, who is opening your mind on possibilities like how to use social media to organize a great demonstration or what to consider using new medias);
• Harrys Puusepp (The Head of the Police and Border Guard Board representing Police's view and attitude on youth involvement in demonstrations)
• and others...

Stay in touch and be informed also via Facebook!

Participants: 80 participants from Denmark, Greece, France, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Georgia, Armenia and Moldova

In brief

In the recent years demonstrations in European countries have had violent consequences. Often young people have been involved in such aggressive demonstrations. Young people are very sensitive to all the changes in the society and are very eager on spreading their opinions. They strongly believe in their power to make a change. In society, people aged 14-30 are usually the most active participants in public events and are actively remodeling norms of behavior. By that age they also belong to the group of potential demonstrators.

Therefore it is very important that they would accept demonstrations as a peaceful way of how to express their opinions rather then preferring violent participation for the action itself. It is important for the experts to know how to guide the youth in the matter of demonstrations. Estonian National Youth Council (ENL) finds the subject to be of relevancy. Demonstration is an essential form of expression in a healthy society, but it should be conducted in a peaceful manner.

Topics and value of the conference

The topics of the conference will also include riots and demonstrations. The conference will try to find what are the reasons of recent violent demonstrations. The conference will include experts from Greece, Russia, France, Denmark, Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia, who will introduce the history and tradition of demonstrations in their countries and comment why the riots have taken place in their countries. A discussion will be held around the means that demonstrators use.

In the second conference day a peaceful simulation demonstration will be held together with the participants in the center of Tallinn. The topic of the demonstration will not be a realistic or from any party's or ENL's agenda in order to guarantee objective simulation.

The main aims of the conference:

• Conference will give anoverview of the demonstrationsheld in the three Baltic countries and various European countries over the last years and the organisers of the demonstrations.

• Participants will discusshow and whydemonstrations appear and are being held; also what should be thevaluesthat demand standing up and engaging in a demonstration. The role ofhistory and culturewill be discussed in the frame of demonstrations and riots.
• The conference will give knowledge onhow willing are the people really to engage in demonstrations?What are thetopics that bring people outon the streets?
• Participants willget to take part in a demonstration,which is being organized the way they should -peacefully.They will learn how to make themselves heard by not causing any inconveniences in the society and by not violating the rules. The will gain this experience in a supervised environment. The topic of the demonstrationwill not be a realistic or from any party's or ENL's agendain order to guarantee objective simulation.
• Theconnection between youth and the development of new mediawill be discussed in the frames of demonstrations and riots (as for example in 2005 the riot in France, Toulouse, was coordinated entirely by the Internet bloggers).

Background information

The subject of "Youth Involvement in Demonstrations" has not been previously an open topic in any seminar or conference, since the demonstrations in recent years in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have been a new phenomenon. ENL considers it to be an important topic that should be studied. Owing especially to the media, we have been led to the understanding that most of the people participating in these recent demonstrations were, surprisingly, young people. ENL is curious to provide the youth leaders with all the necessary knowledge's on how to demonstrate peacefully based on the recent examples of history in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, France, Denmark, Greece and Russia.

ENL is not against demonstrations, but believes there is an intelligent way for carrying them out. It is important that people would be aware of it from as early age as possible.

Expected results

The anticipated long-term result of the project is a better-developed civic society and wiser culture of expression. The conclusion of the survey will give a better understanding on how to apply youth-oriented communicative activities.

Other technical details

• Type of involvement: ENL covers all costs (accommodation, catering and travel). Accommodation is guaranteed in Swissotel ype of involvement: ENL covers all costs (accommodation, catering and travel). Accommodation is guaranteed in Swissotel Tallinn.
• Date and place of the meeting: the conference activities will take place in Tallinn on 2nd and 3rd November 2010. The participants are expected to arrive on the 1st of November. Expected departure is in the afternoon of 3d of November.
• Language of the conference: English (no translations)

Please find the expert application form here.