What is the CJE?

What we are

We have a commitment: to participate in the design of policies that directly or indirectly affect young people in order to improve the quality of life of young people and respond to their problems, concerns and aspirations.

The Youth Council of Spain (CJE) is a platform of more than 60 youth organizations, created by law in 1983 and formed by the Youth Councils of the Autonomous Communities and statewide youth organizations. We promote the participation of youth in the political, social, economic and cultural development of our State in a global environment, as stated in Article 48 of the Spanish Constitution.

Our values are:

Democratic and pluralistic participation

As a means to exercise full citizenship in society.

Social commitment

Equal opportunity

Dialogue

Respect for diversity

In its broadest sense.

Our representative, critical and vindictive work has consolidated the CJE as a valid interlocutor of the interests of young people and at the same time has allowed us to conquer spaces of action in which young people have ceased to be mere spectators to become protagonists.

Structure

Standing Committee

The Permanent Commission is the management body of the Spanish Youth Council. It is elected by the General Assembly for a two-year term and is composed of seven or nine young people from the different member entities that are part of the CJE.It is responsible for political direction and for carrying out the lines of action entrusted to it by the assembly through the work plan and is accountable for the management of the CJE at the end of its term of office.

Technical team

The Technical Team is the group of professionals that works to carry out the decisions adopted by the Permanent Commission and accompanies it in the fulfillment of its task at the head of the CJE.It is made up of people hired to cover a wide range of professional profiles and who work in a coordinated manner from the different areas and spheres of the institution.The Technical Team is headed by the Management.

Warranties Committee

The Guarantees Commission is the body in charge of supervising and interpreting the internal regulations and rules governing the CJE in the event of any conflict or problem that may arise.It is made up of up to five persons from different entities and its term of office is two years.

International Relations Committee

The International Relations Committee is a body attached to the Standing Committee with the aim of assisting in the fulfillment of the CJE's goals in international representation, as well as to facilitate the connection of the work in the international field with the areas of work.It is made up of a maximum of seven people from the different member entities that are part of the CJE.

Spanish Youth Council

Organization chart

Raul Almarcha
Manager
- Silvia Carreño
  Political Advocacy
  - Paula del Pino
    Incident technician
  - Ruben Diaz
    Research
- Antonio Martinez
  Communication
- Shakti Alonso
  Training and projects
  - Jorge Moral
    Dialogue with Youth
- Coral Cespedes
  Administration and services
  - Marc Collado
    Accounting
    - Silvia Avila
      Administrative Assistant

What do we stand for?

The Youth Councils are participatory bodies whose main purpose is to channel the voice of youth in a free and effective manner.

We actively work to strengthen the vision of youth as a youth collective, that is, as a demographic group with particular and common problems, which makes it necessary for them to make collective demands to improve their situation.

We also collaborate with organizations and young people to train them and provide them with tools that allow them a full capacity to participate on the part of youth. The only way that there can be a participation in a correct and effective way, is that the youth have the capacity to be able to participate in the debates in a full way, therefore one of our objectives is the training of the organizations that conform us, but also of the youth as a collective.

Youth rights

We collaborate with social agents and political parties to provide solutions and answers to the problems and concerns of young people.

Political incidence

We design, create and lead proposals to empower young people and give them a voice in the processes carried out by the government and chambers of representation.

Participation

We guarantee that all youth entities and councils are protagonists in the decision-making processes.

Networking

We cooperate with youth and third sector organizations to improve the quality of life of young people and respond to their problems.

What do we think?

The Spanish Youth Council's mission is to improve the living conditions of young people and to this end it develops different actions to influence public policies and the proposals of organizations and institutions. But to build these proposals, the Council does so through processes of dialogue and debate that crystallize in its political positions. In this sense, the CJE has different ways of expressing its proposals:

On the one hand, there is the Basic Document, which is a compendium of all the demands that the Council has been developing in different areas, from youth rights policies, to proposals to achieve full equality or to promote a just ecological transition. This document is approved at the Ordinary General Assembly where it is submitted to the debate of the entities that are part of the Council and can be amended or updated by the proposals of the working groups that the CJE enables for this purpose.

Then, to respond to current events and those events that require a more urgent position, there are the resolutions, which are shorter texts on a specific topic by means of which the member entities and councils express their will and claims towards society, public administrations or institutions. Resolutions are approved in Executive Assemblies at the proposal of a working group, a member entity or the Permanent Commission.

Dialogue with Youth

Dialogue with Youth is a European Union initiative that promotes the participation of youth in political, social, economic and cultural development at all territorial levels, from local to European; and encourages debate between young people and decision-makers for the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of public policies that have an impact on youth.

The program has groups of young volunteers in each autonomous community (called Embassies) that implement different types of consultative activities with the objective of extracting information about the opinion of youth on the themes of each cycle, based on the European Youth Goals.

The EU Dialogue with Youth is coordinated by the Spanish Youth Council in collaboration with INJUVE, and co-financed by the European Union's Erasmus+ program.