Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Organizer
Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Office in Kosovo
01-04 SEPTEMBER, 2016
in
Kosovo
concludes
that,
the
country
has
the
highest
unemployment rate in Europe and Central Asia, at 45 percent, that in groupage 15-24, is almost five time higher than average for that in the European
Union.1
There are only few empirical studies and statistical data on youth in Kosovo,
especially comparative studies between Kosovar youth and other Europeans.
According to one of the rare opinion survey of Kosovo youth, there is low level
1 World Bank "Kosovo-Youth in jeopardy: being young, unemployed, and poor in Kosovo-a report on youth
employment in Kosovo." (Washington: World Bank, 2008)
of trust in institutions and most youth do not feel represented in politics (64%).
As the report further describes; Kosovo youth express considerable scepticism
(51%) on influencing the governance through voting.2
differences between Kosovo-Albanian and Kosovo-Serb youth attitudes. KosovoAlbanian youth are generally more optimistic about their prospective and the
future of the state, whereby this is not the case for the Kosovo-Serb youth,
whose views over the future are more pessimistic. Regarding the European
Integration, youth are supportive with 88% that believe that Kosovo should be
a European Union member state, as many as 50% declaring Kosovo should join
EU within the next five years. But as report remarks, for most of the youth, EU
integration translates into free movement and visa liberalization.3 Apparently
there is a large misconception of understanding the EU and European
integration among youth; since many of them reduce it mainly to free travel
possibilities and better work opportunities. As was illustrated recently by study
that Friedrich Ebert Stiftung has supported, the perspective of youth across
the Balkans looks very pessimistic.
low level of institutional trust and political participation. In this regard, youth
in the Balkans have a chance to be promoter of democratization and
development,
if
they
actively
participate
and
engage
in
the
political