Gay marriage worldwide zürich

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash. The main trigger were young people protesting around the globe and demanding that their governments finally take the threat seriously and significantly increase the efforts in limiting greenhouse gas emissions. Transnational movements such as MeToo, BlackLivesMatter and FridaysforFuture show how quickly and effectively young people can organise and make themselves heard across national and regional borders.

But activism by young people is of course not a new phenomenon — it has a long history, with the demonstrations against the Vietnam war or the Black Panther movement being but two examples. With this post, we aim to draw attention to this blind spot in scholarship and offer some thoughts and possible guidelines for a future research agenda on the role of age in international law and politics.

Despite the fact that the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child CRC enshrines political participation rights of children and young people Art. Children and people of young age are the subject of numerous international treaties, but the common denominator is that they are treated as a group of the population needing particular care and protection rather than being active agents.

Examples include the already mentioned CRC or international conventions on child labour such as the Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention. In human rights law, young age can be a ground for discrimination cf. When it comes to the question of who makes international politics, concludes international agreements and writes international law, academic discourse paints a picture of international relations as the exclusive realm of adult professional politicians, diplomats and experts.

Ways to actively participate in international law-making hardly exist. Needless to say that young people are underrepresented in international organizations, with the average age in the UN being at 45,9 years and at the World Meteorological Organization even at 48,9 years see here.

Most international courts foresee minimum-age requirements or require that judges fulfil the qualifications in their respective countries for the highest judicial offices, like the ICJ statute. Naturally, this excludes young people. And even though over the past two decades, international organisations have increased their permeability for children and young people as representatives of their age group, thus fulfilling the right to political participation enshrined in the CRC, all too often this right to political participation is then realised in institutional niches created specifically for children and young people, which are detached from the actual day-to-day business of international organisations see on the rather indirect and informal participation of UN Youth Delegates the contribution by Antonia Kuhn to this symposium.

Despite the undeniable influence of young people on international politics, one can thus still ask oneself today: Would Malala Yousafzai, who was 17 years old at the time, have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize even without an adult — Kailash Satyarthi — at her side?

Despite the current massive public interest in the political activism of young people in the light of the Friday climate protests, such an appreciation of the influence of young people on national and international politics would be historically unique. The social and political commitment of young people, their presence in political discourse and especially their participation in the context of international conference diplomacy are again perceived as an extraordinary moment, as an escape from the supposed basic state of political apathy.

It is therefore not so surprising that the role of young people in international law and politics is highly underexplored in the disciplines of International Politics and International Law. Most likely, the invisibility of children and young people in academia and their very limited possibilities of political representation in the structures of global governance mutually reinforce each other.

A consequence is that for the analysis of the participation of young people, and especially children, in international politics, the necessary data is quickly lacking. Beyond the frequent practice of inviting children and young people to international events merely as extras or in the form of folkloric contributions, only a few cases are known to date in which children and young people have actively participated in international negotiations.

Gay marriage weltweit: die aktuelle situation in zürich beleuchtet

A prominent example is the debate in the context of the International Labour Organization on international standards in the field of child labour from the late s. What becomes especially evident is the existence of intra- and intergenerational conflicts. At least in public discourse, we have for some time been observing a polarization between the generations, which often goes hand in hand with discrediting and delegitimizing the other.

The open antagonism between old and young becomes even more striking if we also take political attitudes conservative, right-wing, liberal, left-wing into account. It becomes quickly clear that our perception of the role of youth in international politics tends to be limited to progressive, liberal positions climate protection, social justice, gay marriage, open borders, pro-Europe, etc.

On the other hand, the participation of young people nationally and internationally has a strongly polarising effect even within generations — between those who consider it necessary, legitimate and progressive and those who consider it superfluous, impudent and rebellious.

Thus, at least two cracks appear with regard to youth — between generations and within generations. This raises the question: Can identification with a marginalized age group overlay other differences? What role does it play that young age, compared to other identities, is only a transitionary identity, and that the young and marginalized of today maybe become those in power tomorrow?

In conclusion, we would like to argue that not so much young age, but intra- and intergenerational relations should be the object of research.