Peace and Conflict Studies - Spring 2014

Peace and Conflict Studies Volume 21, Number 1 40 encourage and support peace and reconciliation between young people from both nationalist and unionist communities in the North and young people from the South of Ireland. The programme employs a number of approaches to delivering Mutual Understanding, and all offer accredited training, as well as informal and one-to-one support (see Fitzpartick and Associates, 2008 for further details). A 2008 evaluation found clear evidence of Mutual Understanding having been advanced. The level of cross-community and cross-border contact among past participants up to two years after the end of the programme is 80%. Indeed 93% of the Northern participants have maintained cross border and cross-community contact. This was one of the highest indicators of lasting mutual understanding (Fitzpartick and Associates, 2008, p. 6). Political Transformation The research literature has highlighted the importance of promoting political engagement among youth. The WIMPS (Where is My Public Servant?) project was founded in Belfast in 2004 by the non-profit organisation Public Achievement. Public Achievement staff work with the young people through their ‘Civic Youth Work’ model (VeLure Roholt, 2005; VeLure Roholt, Hildreth, & Baizerman, 2009), encouraging them to take action on issues they identify as important. Participants are also trained in journalism and media skills to enable them to research and create interviews and articles, and produce video and audio programming. Young people interview politicians and others for video “Hot-Seat” interviews, make films about issues in their communities, and can identify (through a postcode search) and email their elected representatives at local government (District Council), Northern Ireland Assembly, Westminster and European Parliament levels about issues that are important to them. The website also has an active discussion forum, where young people discuss issues that are important and relevant to them. A common criticism of civic education programmes is that too much emphasis is placed on transferring civic “knowledge” and insufficient attention is paid to engaging young people in the practice of democracy (Quaynor, 2012). However, Public Achievement takes the position that young people are citizens now, rather than citizens in preparation (Smyth, 2012, p. 8). This, the director of Public Achievement argues, is in line with Miller’s (2000) active model of citizenship. Distinct from the liberal model (under which citizenship is seen as a set of rights and obligations) and the consumer model (whereby citizens are consumers of services and rights are ‘handed down’); under the active model citizens are actively