Call for Papers
Pushing the Boundaries: Critical International Perspectives on Child and Youth Participation

The CYE Editors

Volume 16 (2006) of CYE will showcase a much needed critical dialogue on participatory research and practice with young people. Now receiving much attention across disciplines and around the world, participatory research and practice has offered a promising new framework for researchers, youth workers and child rights advocates of all kinds who are committed to social justice and change. Participatory approaches to community research with children and youth have demonstrated the multiple benefits of engaging the perspectives of young people: challenging social exclusion, redistributing power within the research process and building the capacity of young people to analyze and transform their own lives and to partner in the building of more sound, democratic, communities. But we have not given enough attention to systematically evaluating and critiquing our practice. This special issue of CYE will offer an international forum to review and advance the field, developing its potential through cross-cultural dialogue, self-reflexive critique, and critical synthesis.

Forefronting contextualized knowledge and personal experiences, participatory research has necessarily placed an emphasis upon the local, often failing to theorize connections to broader social processes. By contrast, this issue will offer a global perspective on participatory work with young people which is grounded in local practice. The special issue will be organized regionally with critical overviews and examples of innovative, reflective, research welcomed from any country. We believe that this will provide an exciting opportunity to exchange learning, strengthen regional coalitions and build international networks of facilitators of research with children. We strongly encourage submissions that provide new insights through cross-cultural dialogue and invite papers that offer a translocal perspective. We hope this issue will establish a basis of comparison between the very different types of youth participatory work happening around the world—from the participatory research and action of the working children’s organizations of South Asia and Latin America, to the urban planning work and children’s councils of the Mediterranean countries to the participatory environmental action groups of Japan.

This special issue will take advantage of the unique format of the CYE online journal. Unlimited by the conventions of print journals, we will be able to include numerous papers and field reports showcasing international youth participatory programs. Editors (to be announced shortly) representing seven regions around the world will encourage submissions from researchers and practitioners to represent regional critical perspectives on youth participation. Potential contributors may send proposed abstracts at any time to the address below to to have their relevance to the special issue evaluated. Papers will be presented in both English and in the native language(s) of the region.

The following is a list of some of the themes we hope to see discussed. This is not intended to limit the range of types of contributions but rather to encourage an expansiveness of themes:

• What are the different guiding theories of participatory practice that are being used?
  
• How has the practice of young people’s participation been developing in innovative ways in different cultures as a result of particular cultural views of the appropriate roles and activities for young people?
  
• What different domains of research and action are young people involved in or excluded from?
  
• At what ages do young people take an active role in development in different parts of the world?
  
• How have gender-related considerations been incorporated in participatory approaches?
  
• Is young peoples’ research taken seriously by formal government and official agencies and what are the different strategies by which this has been achieved in different parts of the world?
  
• In what types of issues has the research of young people been able to contribute to social change?
  
• What is being done to help young people make deeper analyses, including seeing their local research and action as connected to broader global conditions?
  
• What do we know about the significance of different institutional, governmental and legislative contexts at the local and national levels in supporting young people’s participation?
  
• What are the distinctive issues in young people’s participation in planning and design?
  
• What are the relevant historical antecedents in the evolution of participatory approaches involving children and youth?

The Editors, CYE University of Colorado CB 314 Boulder, CO 80309-0314 USA

Tel.: 303 492-1319 Fax: 303 492-6163 Email: cye@colorado.edu