Global Natives have political superpowers: Each other.In 2019, the Opportunity Kitchen started vice versa mentoring. In 2020, over 800.000 young people decided to go into politics and make one hell of an impact on the decade ahead of us.COVID-19 brought painful restrictions, limitations and tough changes.
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Lots of old problems. And new ways to tackle them. Now is the time.
The climate issue is getting more worrying by the day, economic fairness is nowhere in sight, women's rights are still miles off track, racial injustice is a crying shame, democracy has taken some serious blows. Political patterns are firmly established and systems are static, accommodating those in power. Oh, dear!
But now the young are about to join the game. On radically different terms. And in great numbers.
In 2019, 26.000 of our young people opted for the new mentoring scheme "a bolder bond" to play a competent role in politics, contributing to society and to the climate agenda. By late 2020, their number had grown to well over 800.000!
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The Fridays for Future movement showed clearly what activism can achieve and where its limits are.
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Young Global Natives can count on the help of their peers, on the wisdom of the community's smart boomers and on new global thinking. They're still in education, so they team up with experienced, active politicians and thought leaders in our community for the powers of vice versa mentoring, offering them their opinions and learning the ropes in the process. |
Their political superpowers will make a major impact on the 2020ies.
See what some of them, both junior and senior, have to say:
We're from all walks of life. Literally.We come from all walks of life. Many of us know hardship and even poverty from personal experience, there is nothing elitist about our community. We were raised to be global citizens, open-minded and cooperative, with a genuine interest in other societies, cultures, beliefs, and in the history behind them. We've become extremely good at mutuality. This mutuality gives us strength. The lockdown made us see that clearly. |
Let's invent the wheel! - Only kiddin' :))People are constantly looking for solutions that already exist.
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Us-vs-them is toxic, toxic, toxic.Bolsonaro, Duterte, Erdogan, Netanyahu, Trump, Johnson, Putin, Kaczyński, Orbán, Lukaschenko, Salvini and many, many more: Populists, nationalists, bullies!
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Americans are so terrified of socialism! Why ?In Sweden, we often wonder "What seems so terrifying about our way of life?
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Peer superpower: The best things since sliced bread!We talked a lot about politicians. And what we don't like about the way they work.
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Will we dare to question religions?I have always wondered why religions make such a difference between men and women! For once, I'd love to hear stories of imams telling men that they must not beat their wives and kids or sermons of priests giving fathers a telling off for taking their money to the pub when their families go hungry!
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Everything is global. Climate, nature, humanity, our lives.Fridays for Future has shown clearly that we need new political thinking.
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Old style politics need to go. They're not working for us.Most of these folks just can't get out of their set-in-concrete ways. Conservatives
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East and West. Two sides of the same coin.When I was a kid I used to watch American and British series a lot. They seemed pretty cool to me and helped me to learn English. At fourteen, I had the chance to go to Europe and two years later I went to the US. My disappointment was overwhelming. Most people don't know a thing about Asia, let alone the Far East.
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Pragmatic crowd-sourcing. Just my thing.We all have our own agenda. Every one of us.
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Finally, a "we" that includes everyone who is like meBeing a woman does not come with the full package of chances in life anyway.
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Our circles grow so fastI've already done a fair bit of research. My plan is a reform of our national education system, it is obsolete and unfair. Through my peers and their families I can access information on school systems of 58 countries worldwide! More than that, they
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Where I live, everyone takes everything for grantedI have this thing in my mind. I've always had it. It's because of my mum and my grandpa. About the Haves and the Have-nots. They both told me - really, ever since I can think - that people who have carry responsibility for those who don't. Noblesse oblige.
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We have an agenda everyone cares about: GenerationsWe both study sociology and journalism. What we want to establish is a global data bank on intergenerational projects, how they've worked out and what can be learned from them. Before the pandemic we travelled a lot. Backpacking, on a budget.
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I'm an environmentalist. And I know that people are pigs.My brothers and I live in a house right next to a major highway. We get a lot of stuff thrown into our little back garden. Beer cans, cigarette boxes, leftovers from McDonalds, anything really. When I take the underground I see rubbish dumped basically every-where. And when I go online I see the unbelievable amounts of plastic waste in our oceans. Why? Until this summer I was very depressed.
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We're all in the same boat.You and I pursue the same goals. No matter what political party you're in.
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I cannot hear and I cannot speak.
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We delight in "vice versa mentoring"!
These kids want to be where we are now. And they
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Vice versa mentoring. That's how we get things right!The strategy is brilliant. Instead of putting pressure on politicians to do the right thing young people decide to go into politics themselves. And since that can't be done overnight with kids aged 15 to 25, there is something that is possible straight away:
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Of course, they will make mistakes. So have we.Wouldn't we have loved to be able to check with others, with like-minded peers, back when we took our first big decisions and set sails for our own future? Wouldn't we have jumped at the chance to get a smart opinion from people in other countries - from Japan to Brazil, from Canada to Spain or Australia? All of it fast, free and friendly?
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If you want to know more about becoming a Global Native family, please visit the membership page.
However, being a Global Native calls for genuine commitment. It is a way of life. So starting right at the beginning is wise.
Thankfully, there are growing efforts worldwide to support young people's engagement in politics and society. A beautiful example is
"Join Politics" in Germany. We'd be happy to list similar projects from all over the world and welcome your suggestions: Contact.
"Join Politics" in Germany. We'd be happy to list similar projects from all over the world and welcome your suggestions: Contact.