Why do some young people show little or no engagement in environmental and climate protection? How large is the proportion of unengaged young people in Germany, and has this changed over recent years? These and other questions were addressed in the first work package of the project 'Strengthening Youth Engagement for Sustainability through Dialogue and Transformative Learning' which ConPolicy carried out together with several project partners on behalf of the German Environment Agency and the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Climate Action, Nature Conservation, and Nuclear Safety.
Following the publication of a partial report on the results of the first work package in May 2025, the second partial report is now available. It focuses in particular on developments between 2021 and 2023. The findings of the second partial report are based primarily on a secondary data analysis of selected data from the youth study ‘Zukunft? Jugend fragen! – 2023’ in comparison with corresponding survey results from the 2021 study. The analysis reveals that the proportion of young people who have not yet been involved in sustainability issues has risen significantly over the comparison period. In addition, this group of young people tends to be even more difficult to reach with environmental, climate protection, and ecological sustainability issues than before.
The subsequent qualitative interviews with the target group complement the quantitative findings and provide deeper insights into the mindset and lifestyle as well as the heterogeneity of this group. The segmentation derived from this shows that different communication and participation strategies are needed to address these young people in a needs-oriented way on environmental, climate protection, and sustainability issues.
The full report can be found here.
More information about the project can be found here.