The Neo Institute Europa exists because young Europeans are talked about in policy far more often than they are heard in it. We are a Luxembourg-registered non-profit whose analysis is written by early-career researchers, and youth participation is both our subject and our method. This page collects our work on how young people enter European political and economic life, and on what obstructs them.

Why are young Europeans absent from EU policymaking?

Absence is rarely a formal exclusion. It shows up as omission — in agendas, in speeches, in the framing of problems. The 2025 State of the European Union address is a useful case: a speech setting the Union’s priorities for the year ahead that had strikingly little to say about the generation who will live with those priorities longest. Our analysis reads that silence as a structural signal rather than an oversight.

Read: There is Someone Missing From Von Der Leyen’s 2025 SOTEU: It’s Young Europeans

What has happened to entry-level work in Europe?

The rung of the ladder that used to admit people to the labour market has largely been removed. Roles once framed as entry-level now expect experience that cannot be acquired without them. Our analysis works through the EU youth unemployment data and the structural changes behind it, and argues this is a design failure of the labour market rather than a shortcoming of the generation entering it.

Read: Working to Live, Not Allowed to Work: Gen Z and the Broken Labour Market

What are youth protest movements actually about?

Youth-led movements are routinely reduced to their most visible trigger. Nepal’s 2025 protests were widely reported as a reaction to a social media ban; our analysis argues the ban was a catalyst rather than a cause, and that nepotism, blocked mobility and political misrepresentation explain both the scale of the movement and what it is likely to demand next. The pattern generalises well beyond Nepal.

Read: Beyond Social Media Bans: Nepotism, Misrepresentation and the Future of Nepal’s Youth Protests

What does online life cost young women?

Digital platforms were supposed to lower the barrier to public participation. For women they have also raised the cost of it, through surveillance, harassment and the constant management of visibility. Our analysis examines what that trade-off does to who is willing to speak publicly, and what it means for feminist politics in practice rather than in theory.

Read: The Online Life of a 21st Century Woman

How does the Institute involve young researchers?

The Institute runs on a volunteer model in which early-career researchers and analysts lead the work and senior advisors support them. Every article carries a named author. If you write on European affairs, geopolitics or social policy and want a serious audience for that analysis, email contact@neoinstituteeuropa.org. Prior publication is not a requirement.

The Institute also runs Connected Worlds, a beginner-friendly self-paced online course in international relations, and builds tailored learning programmes for organisations.

All youth and society analysis

Browse the full Youth, Education & Society archive or the related European Affairs & EU Policy archive. For more on the Institute, see the FAQ.