The socialization of youth actors in earth politics

Environmental degradation is one of the most significant challenges faced by humanity, but the current global politics struggle to implement collective solutions. In this context, young people have recently entered the international political arena. Greta Thunberg, a young woman, attracted massive attention on climate change at United Nations’ (UN) conferences. Furthermore, many youth organisations are active. Since 2011, YOUNGO is the official youth umbrella group at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The Global Youth Biodiversity Network presents its views at the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) conferences. Also, major environmental non-governmental organisations are opening youth branches. While youth representation unfolds with unprecedented speed and scope, there is no comprehensive scientific knowledge of the formal participation of youth in international environmental negotiations. This paper aims to fill this gap. As the first step of a four-year project on youth in earth politics, it proposes the first systematic inventory of youth actors in the UNFCCC, CBD, and sustainable development goals’ negotiations between 1992-2021. In particular, the analysis of this database enables to discuss youth actors’ socialization in the international political game made of these specific international negotiations (climate, biodiversity and sustainable development). Are the same youth actors engaging in different negotiations? Have they developed common spaces to discuss their formal political engagement? How are they recruited and how do they socialise? This paper will shed light on the formal political engagement of youth actors at the international level on environmental issue