Social Innovation for Better Living

During the peaks of the COVID-19 pandemic, the health problems (of especially elderly) were the most important issue the countries had to deal with and now with the pandemic slowly calming down other issues are coming up front. Among them are the social, economic and educational issues young people (from age 18 - 29) are facing. From the view of health issue they were not affected by the pandemic in a great deal, but went through the same democratic and civic restrictions which might lead to even worse civic and democratic participation of young people on local/national/European level. One of the priorities of the EU is to provide meaningful social, civic and political engagement opportunities for all young people. Young people prefer to support causes that are directly relevant to them. With this project we aim to foster an active participation of young people in the decision-making process, and thus promote a stronger sense of citizenship. Younger generations often seem passive regarding the democratic and civic participation that is why we wish to address them as a main target group, to involve them in the European processes, get them a chance to realize that their opinion, views matter and that they can and should express them. The projects focus is reflecting on the COVID-19 pandemic on local communities, how it has influenced our democratic and civic participation functions. With the project we wish to gain knowledge which are the areas of life that were most effected by the pandemic and exchange good practices of social innovation on how to tackle the issue and proposing new social innovations and solutions how to respond to social needs and consequently increase democratic and civic participation.