A Youth Forum
- Paper number
IAC-05-E3.1.08
- Author
Ms. Sandhya Dhaliwal, Space Generation Advisory Council (SGAC), Australia
- Year
2005
- Abstract
The Legal Subcommittee of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UN COPUOS) is the international body responsible for insuring that space is governed in the best interests of the world’s population. The outcomes of the annual meeting are far-reaching across the globe yet there is an evident discrepancy, in that the views of today’s youth (and tomorrow’s carriers of the ‘space pioneer’ flame) are not represented during the deliberations. Youth participation and collaboration in current planning for space exploration is imperative if a seamless transition is to be achieved from this generation to the next. The proposal put forward by the Space Policy, Law and Governance workshop at the annual meeting of the Space Generation Congress in 2004 was to establish a youth based ‘Moot UN COPUOS Legal Subcommittee’ meeting intended to run alongside, or prior to, actual subcommittee proceedings. We propose to coordinate a program whereby a youth delegation will participate in a \"mirror\" session of the COPUOS Legal Subcommittee meeting on a yearly basis. The results of the mirror session will be submitted to COPUOS in the form of a report for which feedback would be obtained. It is felt that this process will be of considerable benefit to the renewed productivity of COPUOS as the influx of innovative ideas, renewed objectives, and timely determination will add yet another important dimension to the Legal Subcommittee’s deliberations. The Space Generation Advisory Council (that organises the annual Space Generation Congress) presently holds observer status within the UN COPUOS Legal Subcommittee proceedings. Observer status is seen as acknowledging the importance of youth input from around the world and would be considered a precursor to a more formalised status. This paper is aimed at demonstrating the importance of having a formalised youth forum, of enabling the awareness of today’s youth to current space affairs and allowing a means for them to contribute to the development of space policy. Such involvement in UN COPUOS deliberations will also serve as a training ground for the leaders of tomorrow.
- Abstract document