Embedding young people’s voices in global development
International development projects—initiatives often led by NGOs or global agencies aiming to improve education, health, and social conditions in low- and middle-income or conflict-affected countries—are invariably designed to be ‘for’ young people. However, many feel that they are being left out of the picture.
While young people’s voices are presented as key to these initiatives, consultation with them can often be tokenistic. Instead, accountability tends to flow ‘upwards’ to project donors and funders, rather than ‘downwards’ to beneficiaries. This imbalance is stark in the youth and childcare sectors, where children’s perspectives are too often sidelined.
Since 2016, the Changing the Story (CTS) project, led by Professor Paul Cooke, has been working to address this issue in conflict-affected settings. Working with over 200 civil society organisations across 14 countries, the project has used participatory, arts-based research to help young people make their voices heard in the rebuilding of their communities.
Video summary
Impact
- Community engagement: delivered a programme of collaborative activities in Rwanda and South Africa to co-design a model of youth accountability that shifts power towards young people
- Policy impact: contributed to HHC’s international advocacy efforts at the United Nations.
Key information
- Major funders: Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)'s Global Challenges Research Fund
- Partners and collaborators: Fraxinus Trust and Hope, Homes for Children, the British Council, UNESCO, Oxfam, the UK Department for Culture, Media & Sport
- Disciplines: film, community engagement, global challenges
- Investigators: Professor Paul Cooke, Dr Katie Hodgkinson.
Systems that aren’t serving their beneficiaries
Many childcare systems across the globe are driven by institutional needs or international interests, not by the needs of children themselves. From ‘orphanage tourism’ to performative development programmes, young people are often treated as passive recipients of aid rather than active stakeholders.
CTS’s latest strand of work is built around a transformative question: What would development look like if young people were truly in the driver’s seat? And what structural changes are needed for organisations to be genuinely accountable to them?
In partnership with Fraxinus Trust and Hope and Homes for Children (HHC), their research set out to co-design a definition and system of child-focused accountability that can be embedded across development organisations.
In doing so, they hope to trigger global systemic change that will prevent exploitation and improve children’s wellbeing, sense of empowerment and community belonging.
Building new structures with young people, not for them
To make this vision a reality, the team will deliver a programme of collaborative activities in Rwanda and South Africa to co-design a model of youth accountability that shifts power towards young people.
The project will begin with a series of co-production workshops, where young people explore what accountability means to them and what they think services would look like if their voices were central. These sessions will be followed by advocacy training, equipping young people with the skills and confidence to express their views and push for reform.
The team will then facilitate conversations between service providers, young people and policy makers—creating space for participants to engage key decision makers with how current systems affect them and where change is needed.
Insights from these conversations will feed into ‘learning together’ workshops with staff from Hope and Homes for Children (HHC)—an international organisation that helps children and young people move from institutions into family-based care.
These collaborative sessions will focus on developing strategies to embed youth voice within the organisation’s own structures and processes. The impact of these changes will be monitored to assess how well they empower young people to have their voices heard.
Together, these activities will inform the design of the ‘Radical Youth Accountability’ model and shape a subsequent ‘Radical Youth Accountability Toolkit’. This practical resource will support the embedding of youth-led accountability at scale, outlining context-specific approaches for defining, implementing, and evaluating youth-led accountability.
The toolkit will be shared with key stakeholders, including donors, practitioners and policymakers, to normalise shifting power to young people.
Underpinning the entire process is an arts-based participatory action research approach, which values the emotional and expressive power of creative practices as valid and vital forms of knowledge.
Changing the Story’s impact
The youth accountability strand of CTS is already influencing policy and practice. In partnership with Hope and Homes for Children (HHC), youth-led definitions of accountability are beginning to be embedded into governance structures.
Co-production workshops and advocacy activities have enabled young people to engage directly with policymakers, including contributing to HHC’s international advocacy efforts at the United Nations.
The Radical Youth Accountability model is informing conversations across the child development sector and strengthening HHC’s role as a pioneer in youth-centred practice. A practical toolkit based on this model is currently in development, and early interest from international NGOs and funders signals the potential for wider systemic change.
Primary investigator Professor Paul Cooke said: “I am particularly proud of our partnership with Hope and Homes for Children and their ambition to put the young people they serve into the driving seat of how they operate as an organisation.”
Since its inception in 2016, CTS has demonstrated how arts-based, participatory research can empower young people affected by inequality, marginalisation, or social change.
The research has informed two books, 50+ academic articles, 15 policy reports, 10 toolkits, and eight award-winning films shown at over 45 festivals. Its work has shaped on education curricula in Rwanda and Kosovo, supported youth leadership models in South Africa, and informed the rollout of the Tribal Education Methodology in Kerala, India.
Alongside the creation of Colombia’s My History Foundation, the project has fostered partnerships—such as with the British Council—that have led to over £1.5 million in follow-on funding. Through sustained engagement with global actors like UNESCO, Oxfam, and the UK Department for Culture, Media & Sport, CTS continues to influence how development sectors centre youth voice and leadership.
The teams’ success was recognised at the University of Leeds’ Research Impact and Engagement Awards 2024, where the project took home the winning prize for 'emerging societal impact.’
What’s next for youth empowerment?
Through their Knowledge Transfer Partnership with HHC, CTS will make radical youth accountability part of daily practice across multiple countries. This work will go on until January 2028 when they will share their findings with NGOs, donors, and policy leaders.
A team led by Dr Katie Hodgkinson is currently embedding CTS’s broader research into the British Council’s Youth Connect programme, using transrational voice and affective education to shift global development norms.
What began as a post-conflict development project is now contributing to a global movement—one that sees youth not as passive recipients of aid, but as agents of accountability, change, and justice.
As new crises emerge, the CTS team is supporting the sector to lay the groundwork for a radical shift in development culture—one where the future isn’t just imagined for young people but co-authored by them.