RYCO Publication: A Better Region Starts with YOUth (2020)

This short summary does not only remind us of
the history of this new and young organisation, it
is also a good starting point to better understand
the political importance and significance of
RYCO and why this new institution is indeed
something special and unique. Four points
should be underlined in this perspective:
1) Regional cooperation is not the dominant
trend within the Western Balkans, where political
relations remain tense and where regional
initiatives are sometimes announced but are not
implemented. RYCO was created in spite of and
against this trend. While the difficult general
political context can have a negative influence
on the work of RYCO the very fact that it has
been established and is working underlines that
a form of common cooperation is possible within
the Western Balkans, between the six
governments and beyond. The singularity of
RYCO appears also in the fact that it was the
very first outcome of the Berlin Process and
remains one of the few to appear thus far.
2) RYCO is neither a governmental agency nor
a youth NGO, but an institution by its own with
its own legal structure. RYCO was established
through a cooperation process between
governments and civil society actors and the
institution embodies this partnership structurally.
This is especially true of the Governing
Board of RYCO, which is the highest decisionmaking
body, where there is equal representation
among youth and government
representatives. Yet this is by no means selfevident,
knowing the mutual mistrust that
generally exists between governments and civil
societies in the region. In fact, such a close and
structural interlinkage between civil society
and government as in the case of RYCO did not
exist within the Western Balkans before. The
strong position of youth representatives in the
Governing Board goes beyond many similar
institutions at the international level, such as the
Franco-German Youth Office where government
representatives dominate the administrative
board.
Members of the RYCO Working Group with the EU and the Western Balkan leaders
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© European Union, 2016, EC - Audiovisual Service