Abstract:

Many young people feel their generation is under pressure to solve environmental issues such as climate change but do not consider they are well prepared or capable of addressing these challenges. Alongside this, there has been a strong call for citizenship education and opportunities for youth to act as agents of change for environmental and sustainable development – to be placed at the top of educational agendas in many European countries . This paper explores citizen inquiry as a novel and participatory approach to developing environmental citizenship in young people across Europe. To illustrate how young people inquired into environmental issues and created positive change in their own communities, this paper will draw upon case studies from an Erasmus+ project: Young Citizens for Change: Developing Environmental Activism in Young People through creative Citizen Inquiry (2022-2023) with partners in Germany, Spain, Norway and England.

Collaborative initiatives, such as citizen science, are widely used to engage people and build educative capacity by facilitating opportunities to take part in scientific investigations. Despite their potential to foster scientific knowledge, skills, and civic engagement in environmental issues, citizen science initiatives often encounter limitations. These include: the passive role of participants as data collectors and a stark participation inequality of initiatives predominantly gaining traction among a demographic of middle-class, middle-aged, well-educated men.

In response to these limitations, this paper demonstrates how citizen inquiry methodologies blend elements of citizen science and inquiry-based learning to involve young people directly in the process of identifying environmental issues and investigating solutions. These case studies across Europe show how citizen inquiry broadens the demographic to involve young people by developing their relevant knowledge, skills and behaviours to create positive environmental change. This paper highlights the flexibility and inclusivity of citizen inquiry approaches with young people across Europe as well as its relevance to formal and informal education settings. It will also discuss innovative uses of digital technologies (e.g. mobile phones, apps, 360-video) as important tools for supporting the process of youth-led inquiry-based investigations on local and global environmental issues. Overall, this paper aims to contribute to participatory and innovative ways for young people to develop environmental citizenship across Europe.

Keywords:

Citizen inquiry, technology, youth.