The youth rights movement (also known as youth liberation) seeks to grant the

rights Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory ...

young people Youth is the time of life when one is young. The word, youth, can also mean the time between childhood and adulthood ( maturity), but it can also refer to one's peak, in terms of health or the period of life known as being a young adult. You ...

that are traditionally reserved for

adult An adult is a human or other animal that has reached full growth. In human context, the term ''adult'' has meanings associated with social and legal concepts. In contrast to a " minor", a legal adult is a person who has attained the age of maj ...

s, due to having reached a specific age or sufficient maturity. This is closely akin to the notion of evolving capacities within the

children's rights Children's rights are a subset of human rights with particular attention to the rights of special protection and care afforded to minors.

movement, but the youth rights movement differs from the children's rights movement in that the latter places emphasis on the welfare and protection of children through the actions and decisions of adults, while the youth rights movement seeks to grant youth the liberty to make their own decisions autonomously in the ways adults are permitted to, or to lower the legal minimum ages at which such rights are acquired, such as the

age of majority The age of majority is the threshold of legal adulthood as recognized or declared in law. It is the moment when minors cease to be considered such and assume legal control over their persons, actions, and decisions, thus terminating the contr ...

and the voting age. Youth rights have increased over the last century in many countries. The youth rights movement seeks to further increase youth rights, with some advocating intergenerational equity. Codified youth rights constitute one aspect of how youth are treated in society. Other aspects include social questions of how adults see and treat youth, and how open a society is to youth participation.

Issues

Of primary importance to advocates of youth rights are historical perceptions of young people, which they say are

oppressive Oppression is malicious or unjust treatment or exercise of power, often under the guise of governmental authority or cultural opprobrium. Oppression may be overt or covert, depending on how it is practiced. Oppression refers to discrimination wh ...

and informed by

paternalism Paternalism is action that limits a person's or group's liberty or autonomy and is intended to promote their own good. Paternalism can also imply that the behavior is against or regardless of the will of a person, or also that the behavior expres ...

adultism Adultism is "the power adults have over children". More narrowly, adultism is defined as "prejudice and accompanying systematic discrimination against young people". On a more philosophical basis, the term has also been defined as "bias towards ad ...

and

ageism Ageism, also spelled agism, is discrimination against individuals or groups on the basis of their age. The term was coined in 1969 by Robert Neil Butler to describe discrimination against seniors, and patterned on sexism and racism. Butler d ...

in general, as well as fears of

children A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger ...

and

youth Youth is the time of life when one is young. The word, youth, can also mean the time between childhood and adulthood ( maturity), but it can also refer to one's peak, in terms of health or the period of life known as being a young adult. Yo ...

. Several of these perceptions made by society include the assumption that young people are incapable of making crucial decisions and need protecting from their tendency to act impulsively. Youth rights advocates believe those perceptions inform

laws Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vari ...

throughout society, including voting age,

child labor laws Child labour laws are statutes placing restrictions and regulations on the work of minors. Child labour increased during the Industrial Revolution due to the children's abilities to access smaller spaces and the ability to pay children less wage ...

right-to-work law In the context of labor law in the United States, the term "right-to-work laws" refers to state laws that prohibit union security agreements between employers and labor unions which require employees who are not union members to contribute ...

curfews A curfew is a government order specifying a time during which certain regulations apply. Typically, curfews order all people affected by them to ''not'' be in public places or on roads within a certain time frame, typically in the evening and ...

, drinking/ smoking age, gambling age,

age of consent The age of consent is the age at which a person is considered to be legally competent to consent to sexual acts. Consequently, an adult who engages in sexual activity with a person younger than the age of consent is unable to legally cla ...

, driving age,

youth suffrage Youth suffrage, or children's suffrage, is the right of youth to vote and forms part of the broader youth rights movement. Until recently Iran had a voting age of 15; Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Cuba, Ecuador and Nicaragua have a voting age of 16 ...

emancipation of minors Emancipation of minors is a legal mechanism by which a minor before attaining the age of majority is freed from control by their parents or guardians, and the parents or guardians are freed from responsibility for their child. Minors are norm ...

, minors and abortion, closed adoption, corporal punishment, the

, and

military conscription Conscription (also called the draft in the United States) is the state-mandated enlistment of people in a national service, mainly a military service. Conscription dates back to antiquity and it continues in some countries to the present day un ...

. Restrictions on young people that would be considered unacceptable if applied to adults are viewed by youth rights advocates as a form of

discrimination Discrimination is the act of making unjustified distinctions between people based on the groups, classes, or other categories to which they belong or are perceived to belong. People may be discriminated on the basis of Racial discrimination, r ...

. There are specific sets of issues addressing the rights of youth in schools, including

zero tolerance A zero tolerance policy is one which imposes a punishment for every infraction of a stated rule.zero tolerance, n.' (under ''zero, n.''). The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Ed. 1989. Retrieved 10 November 2009. Italy, Japan, Singapore China, Indi ...

, " gulag schools", '' In loco parentis'', and student rights in general.

Homeschooling Homeschooling or home schooling, also known as home education or elective home education (EHE), is the education of school-aged children at home or a variety of places other than a school. Usually conducted by a parent, tutor, or an onlin ...

, unschooling, and

alternative school An alternative school is an educational establishment with a curriculum and methods that are nontraditional. Such schools offer a wide range of philosophies and teaching methods; some have strong political, scholarly, or philosophical orientati ...

s are popular youth rights issues. A long-standing effort within the youth rights movements has focused on

civic engagement Civic engagement or civic participation is any individual or group activity addressing issues of public concern. Civic engagement includes communities working together or individuals working alone in both political and non-political actions to ...

. Other issues include mandatory allowance and non-authoritarian parenting. There have been a number of historical campaigns to increase youth

voting rights Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in representative democracy, public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally i ...

by lowering the voting age and the age of candidacy. There are also efforts to get young people elected to prominent positions in local communities, including as members of

city council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, rural coun ...

s and as mayors. For example, in the 2011 Raleigh mayoral election 17-year-old Seth Keel launched a campaign for Mayor despite the age requirement of 21. Strategies for gaining youth rights that are frequently utilized by their advocates include developing

youth programs Youth programs are particular activities designed to involve people between the ages of 10 and 25. Activities included are generally oriented towards youth development through recreation, social life, prevention, intervention, or education. Dur ...

and

organizations An organization or organisation (Commonwealth English; see spelling differences), is an entity—such as a company, an institution, or an association—comprising one or more people and having a particular purpose. The word is derived from ...

that promote

youth activism Youth activism is the participation in community organizing for social change by persons between the ages of 15–24. Youth activism has led to a shift in political participation and activism. A notable shift within youth activism is the rise of ...

, youth participation,

youth empowerment Youth empowerment is a process where children and young people are encouraged to take charge of their lives. They do this by addressing their situation and then take action in order to improve their access to resources and transform their consciou ...

, youth voice,

youth/adult partnerships Youth-adult partnership is a conscious relationship that establishes and sustains intergenerational equity between young people and adults. Youth-adult partnerships often display a high degree of youth rights and autonomy, and is often synonymo ...

, intergenerational equity and

civil disobedience Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government (or any other authority). By some definitions, civil disobedience has to be nonviolent to be called "civil". H ...

between young people and adults.

History

First emerging as a distinct movement in the 1930s, youth rights have long been concerned with

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life ...

and intergenerational equity. Tracing its roots to

youth activists Youth is the time of life when one is young. The word, youth, can also mean the time between childhood and adulthood ( maturity), but it can also refer to one's peak, in terms of health or the period of life known as being a young adult. Yout ...

during the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

, youth rights has influenced the

civil rights movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the Unite ...

opposition to the Vietnam War Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War (before) or anti-Vietnam War movement (present) began with demonstrations in 1965 against the escalating role of the United States in the Vietnam War and grew into a broad social move ...

, and many other movements. Since the advent of the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, p ...

, the youth rights movement has been gaining predominance again.

Fallibility and individual differences

Certain youth rights advocates use the argument of fallibility against the belief that others can know what is best or worst for an individual, and criticize the children's rights movement for assuming that exterior legislators, parents, authorities and so on can know what is for a "minor"'s own good. These thinkers argue that the ability to correct what others think about one's own

welfare Welfare, or commonly social welfare, is a type of government support intended to ensure that members of a society can meet basic human needs such as food and shelter. Social security may either be synonymous with welfare, or refer specifical ...

in a falsificationist (as opposed to

postmodernist Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or mode of discourseNuyen, A.T., 1992. The Role of Rhetorical Devices in Postmodernist Discourse. Philosophy & Rhetoric, pp.183–194. characterized by skepticism toward the " grand narratives" of modern ...

) manner constitutes a non-arbitrary mental threshold at which an individual can speak for his or herself independently of exterior assumptions, as opposed to arbitrary chronological minimum ages in legislation. They also criticize the carte blanche for arbitrary definitions of "maturity" implicit in children's rights laws such as "with rising age and maturity" for being part of the problem, and suggest the absolute threshold of conceptual after-correcture to remedy it. These views are often supported by people with experience of the belief in absolutely gradual mental development being abused as an argument for "necessity" of arbitrary distinctions such as

which they perceive as oppressive (either currently oppressing or having formerly oppressed them, depending on age and jurisdiction), and instead cite types of

connectionism Connectionism refers to both an approach in the field of cognitive science that hopes to explain mental phenomena using artificial neural networks (ANN) and to a wide range of techniques and algorithms using ANNs in the context of artificial in ...

that allows for critical phenomena that encompasses the entire

brain A brain is an organ (biology), organ that serves as the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals. It is located in the head, usually close to the sensory organs for senses such as Visual perception, vision. I ...

. These thinkers tend to stress that different individuals reach the critical threshold at somewhat different ages with no more than one in 365 (one in 366 in the case of leap years) chance of coinciding with a birthday, and that the relevant difference that it is acceptable to base different treatment on is only between individuals and not between jurisdictions. Generally, the importance of judging each individual by observable relevant behaviors and not by birth date is stressed by advocates of these views.

Youth rights

Children's rights Children's rights are a subset of human rights with particular attention to the rights of special protection and care afforded to minors.

cover all rights belonging to children. When individuals grow up, they are granted new rights (such as voting, consent, and driving) and duties (such as criminal responsibility and draft eligibility). There are different

minimum In mathematical analysis, the maxima and minima (the respective plurals of maximum and minimum) of a function, known collectively as extrema (the plural of extremum), are the largest and smallest value of the function, either within a given r ...

limits of age at which

are, situationally, not independent or deemed legally competent to make certain decisions or take certain actions. Some rights and responsibilities that legally come with age are: * Voting age * Age of candidacy *

Age of consent The age of consent is the age at which a person is considered to be legally competent to consent to sexual acts. Consequently, an adult who engages in sexual activity with a person younger than the age of consent is unable to legally cla ...

Age of majority The age of majority is the threshold of legal adulthood as recognized or declared in law. It is the moment when minors cease to be considered such and assume legal control over their persons, actions, and decisions, thus terminating the contr ...

Age of criminal responsibility The age of criminal responsibility is the age below which a child is deemed incapable of having committed a criminal offence. In legal terms, it is referred to as a defence/defense of infancy, which is a form of defense known as an excuse so tha ...

Drinking age The legal drinking age is the minimum age at which a person can legally consume alcoholic beverages. The minimum age alcohol can be legally consumed can be different from the age when it can be purchased in some countries. These laws vary between ...

* Driving age * Legal working age *

Right to work The right to work is the concept that people have a human right to work, or engage in productive employment, and should not be prevented from doing so. The right to work is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and recognized ...

* Student rights *

Youth suffrage Youth suffrage, or children's suffrage, is the right of youth to vote and forms part of the broader youth rights movement. Until recently Iran had a voting age of 15; Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Cuba, Ecuador and Nicaragua have a voting age of 16 ...

After youth reach these limits they are free to

vote Voting is a method by which a group, such as a meeting or an electorate, can engage for the purpose of making a collective decision or expressing an opinion usually following discussions, debates or election campaigns. Democracies elect holde ...

, buy or consume alcohol beverages, and drive

cars A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, Car seat, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport private transport#Personal transport, people in ...

, among other acts.

Movement

The "youth rights movement", also described as "youth liberation", is a nascent

grass-roots movement Grassroots democracy is a tendency towards designing political processes that shift as much decision-making authority as practical to the organization's lowest geographic or social level of organization. Grassroots organizations can have a v ...

whose aim is to fight against

and for the

of young people – those "under the age of majority", which is 18 in most countries. It is ostensibly an effort to combat pedophobia and ephebiphobia throughout society by promoting youth voice,

and ultimately, intergenerational equity through

. Advocates of youth rights distinguish their movement from the

children's rights Children's rights are a subset of human rights with particular attention to the rights of special protection and care afforded to minors.

movement, which they argue advocates changes that are often restrictive towards children and youth, and which they accuse of

, pedophobia, and

. They point out distinctions between 1970s youth liberation literature and child rights literature from groups such as the Children's Defense Fund.

Organizations in China

International Youth Rights (IYR) is a student-run youth rights organization in China, with regional chapters across the country and abroad. Its aim is to make voices of youth be heard across the world and give opportunities for youths to carry out their own creative solutions to world issues in real life.

Organizations in Europe

Th
European Youth Forum
(YFJ, from Youth Forum Jeunesse) is the platform of the National Youth Council and International Non-Governmental Youth Organisations in Europe. It strives for youth rights in International Institutions such as the European Union, the Council of Europe and the United Nations. The European Youth Forum works in the fields of youth policy and youth work development. It focuses its work on European youth policy matters, whilst through engagement on the global level it is enhancing the capacities of its members and promoting global interdependence. In its daily work the European Youth Forum represents the views and opinions of youth organisations in all relevant policy areas and promotes the cross-sectoral nature of youth policy towards a variety of institutional actors. The principles of equality and sustainable development are mainstreamed in the work of the European Youth Forum. Other International youth rights organizations include Article 12 in Scotland and K.R.A.T.Z.A. in Germany. In

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

, the voting age has been lowered to 16 in 2018 to vote in national and European Parliament elections. Th
European Youth Portal
is the starting place for the European Union's youth policy, with

Erasmus+ Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (; ; English: Erasmus of Rotterdam or Erasmus;''Erasmus'' was his baptismal name, given after Erasmus of Formiae. ''Desiderius'' was an adopted additional name, which he used from 1496. The ''Roterodamus'' was a s ...

as one of its key initiatives.

Organizations in the United States

The National Youth Rights Association is the primary youth rights organization for the youths in the United States, with local chapters across the country. The organization known as Americans for a Society Free from Age Restrictions is also an important organization. The Freechild Project has gained a reputation for interjecting youth rights issues into organizations historically focused on

youth development Positive youth development (PYD) programs are designed to optimize youth developmental progress. ''Youth.gov'' states that "PYD is an intentional, prosocial approach that engages youth within their communities, schools, organizations, peer groups, ...

and

youth service Youth service refers to non-military, intensive engagement of young people in organized activity that contributes to the local, national, or world community. Youth service is widely recognized and valued by society, with minimal or no compensation ...

through their consulting and training activities. The Global Youth Action Network engages young people around the world in advocating for youth rights, and Peacefire provides

technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, scien ...

-specific support for youth rights activists. Choose Responsibility and their successor organization, the Amethyst Initiative, founded by Dr. John McCardell, Jr., exist to promote the discussion of the drinking age, specifically. Choose Responsibility focuses on promoting a legal drinking age of 18, but includes provisions such as education and licensing. The Amethyst Initiative, a collaboration of college presidents and other educators, focuses on discussion and examination of the drinking age, with specific attention paid to the culture of alcohol as it exists on college campuses and the negative impact of the drinking age on alcohol education and responsible drinking.

Organizations in India

Young India Foundation (YIF) is a youth-led youth rights organization in India, based in Gurgaon with regional chapters across India. Its aim is to make voices of youth be heard across India and seek representation for the 60% of India's demographic that is below the age of 25. YIF is also the organization behind the age of candidacy campaign to bring down the age when a Member of Legislative Assembly or Member of Parliament can contest.

Prominent individuals

Youth rights, as a philosophy and as a movement, has been informed and is led by a variety of individuals and institutions across the United States and around the world. In the 1960s and 70s John Holt,

Richard Farson Richard Farson Ph.D., (November 16, 1926 – June 13, 2017) was an American psychologist, author, and educator. He was the president and chief executive officer of the Western Behavioral Sciences Institute, which he co-founded in 1958 with physici ...

Paul Goodman Paul Goodman (1911–1972) was an American writer and public intellectual best known for his 1960s works of social criticism. Goodman was prolific across numerous literary genres and non-fiction topics, including the arts, civil rights, decen ...

and

Neil Postman Neil Postman (March 8, 1931 – October 5, 2003) was an American author, educator, media theorist and cultural critic, who eschewed digital technology, including personal computers, mobile devices, and cruise control in cars, and was critical ...

were regarded authors who spoke out about youth rights throughout society, including education, government, social services and popular citizenship. Shulamith Firestone also wrote about youth rights issues in the second-wave feminist classic "The Dialectic of Sex."

Alex Koroknay-Palicz Alex Koroknay-Palicz (born July 2, 1981) is an American activist in Washington, D.C. He is the former executive director of the National Youth Rights Association serving in that post from 2000 till 2012. Biography Koroknay-Palicz was born in ...

has become a vocal youth rights proponent, making regular appearances on television and in newspapers.

Mike A. Males Mike A. Males (born 1950) is an American sociologist who is senior researcher for the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, San Francisco, and content director for YouthFacts.org, the online information service on youth issues. He worked f ...

is a prominent sociologist and researcher who has published several books regarding the rights of young people across the United States. Robert Epstein is another prominent author who has called for greater rights and responsibilities for youth. Several organizational leaders, including Sarah Fitz-Claridge of Taking Children Seriously, Bennett Haselton of Peacefire and Adam Fletcher (activist) of The Freechild Project conduct local, national, and international

outreach Outreach is the activity of providing services to any population that might not otherwise have access to those services. A key component of outreach is that the group providing it is not stationary, but mobile; in other words, it involves meetin ...

for youth and adults regarding youth rights.

Giuseppe Porcaro Giuseppe Porcaro, (born 19 March 1979 in Avellino, Italy) is a political geographer, a writer, and an expert in communications, International Relations and Politics of the European Union. Having served for two mandates as Secretary General of the ...

during his mandate as Secretary General of the

European Youth Forum The European Youth Forum (from french: Youth Forum Jeunesse, YFJ) is an international non-profit association and serves as a platform and advocacy group of the national youth councils and international non-governmental youth organisations in Euro ...

edited the second edition of the volume "The International Law of Youth Rights" published by

Brill Publishers Brill Academic Publishers (known as E. J. Brill, Koninklijke Brill, Brill ()) is a Dutch international academic publisher founded in 1683 in Leiden, Netherlands. With offices in Leiden, Boston, Paderborn and Singapore, Brill today publishes 2 ...

References

{{Youth empowerment