Young people as a political subject in the context of environmental governance

The paper addresses how young people are being positioned and recognized as political subjects in environmental governance. Motivated by the rise of youth-led climate activism (e.g., Fridays for Future) and its influence on public discourse, the study argues that youth recognition by policy elites often presumes conformity to existing narratives and forms of participation. The authors note generational gaps in priorities and accountability expectations, and formulate research questions: How is the subject category of “youth” construed in contemporary public discourse on environmental governance? Who is included in this category? How is recognition as a legitimate political subject conditioned within the public sphere? The study aims to develop a theoretical perspective to analyze recognition, discourse structures, and legitimacy regarding youth participation.

The theoretical framing draws on concepts of the public sphere (Habermas) and critiques emphasizing that discourse is saturated with power relations (Fraser; Foucault). Recognition theory is central, engaging with Honneth, Fraser, Taylor, and Butler. While “positive” views (Honneth/Taylor) see recognition as enabling self-actualization, Butler’s ambivalent perspective highlights that recognition is normatively conditioned, molding subjects to meet pre-set criteria of intelligibility. Visibility/invisibility, as discussed by Honneth & Margalit and Rancière, are used as metaphors to analyze who becomes seen and heard in the public sphere. The literature on youth climate activism notes a surge of research and mobilization but also concerns about representation, inclusion, and the regulation of acceptable speech and action. The review situates environmental governance within wider debates about knowledge hierarchies (scientific vs. indigenous/local knowledges) and calls to include recognition to address representation and participation in conservation and governance.

Design: The study is a theoretically driven document analysis used to illustrate a proposed framework on recognition and discourse structuring in the public sphere. It employs theoretical sampling to elaborate relationships among constructs, rather than to generalize empirically.

Corpus: Fourteen documents (media articles and speech transcripts) connected to three early high-profile events featuring Greta Thunberg: (1) UN Climate Action Summit, New York (2019), (2) COP25, Madrid (2019), and (3) World Economic Forum, Davos (2020). These events are considered formative moments for shaping public imaginaries of youth climate activism and the subject category “youth.” Supplementary Materials list the specific items.

Analytical focus:

• Discursive order analysis (Foucault; Laclau & Mouffe) to identify dominant discourses (e.g., scientific discourse) and their epistemological/value assumptions, as well as rules that condition what statements and subject positions are intelligible/legitimate.
• Subject position analysis to examine how “youth” are constructed by media and self-representation (Greta Thunberg), including relational positioning vis-à-vis politicians and scientists, and how visibility is accorded/withheld (text and images).
• Operationalization rejects an essentialist, age-based definition of “youth” and treats it as a contingent, discursively constructed category shaped by power relations, attentive to intersectional and geographic diversity (e.g., differences within the Global North and between Global North/South).

Procedure: Close reading of the 14 items to code for (1) constructions of “youth,” (2) inclusion/exclusion mechanisms, (3) conditions of recognition (speech/action legitimacy), supported by prior research for contextualization. Findings are presented as theoretically informed insights rather than statistically generalizable results.

• Construction of youth subjectivity: Thunberg’s speeches strongly criticize political elites while reaffirming traditional role allocations (e.g., “I shouldn’t be up here… back in school”), positioning youth as external observers/accounters who demand action from leaders rather than directly challenging institutional authority. Youth are cast as holding leaders accountable (“We will never forgive you”) while responsibility for action remains with political elites.
• Visibility regulation: Media and public discourse center Greta Thunberg as the archetype of youth climate activism, often eclipsing other activists. Examples include: (1) Associated Press cropping Vanessa Nakate (the only Black activist present) out of a Davos photo; other agencies misidentified or omitted her in captions; (2) at COP25, while Marshall Islander Carlon Jajok Zackhras spoke, a camera remained on Thunberg for about a minute; questions from 420 journalists were mostly directed to Thunberg. These incidents illustrate how recognition mechanisms grant visibility to certain bodies (often white, Western, middle-class) and marginalize others.
• Dominant discourse: Scientific discourse structures public legitimacy. Early Thunberg speeches adopt scientific terminology and IPCC references (e.g., “tipping points,” “feedback loops,” SR1.5 carbon budget: 420 Gt CO2 on 1/1/2018; ~42 Gt CO2/year emissions). This centers Western scientific epistemology and may marginalize other knowledge systems (e.g., indigenous epistemologies) and political framings.
• Temporal framing: A future-oriented narrative (“for future generations”) can downplay present harms in the Global South; activists like Mitzi Jonelle Tan and Disha Ravi highlight that climate impacts are current realities and critique “white-washed” framing.
• Legitimacy of action: Youth actions gaining recognition align with formal, parliamentary channels and mass mobilizations (e.g., school strikes, summit participation), which do not overtly disrupt power structures. Disruptive civil disobedience is frequently delegitimized as a public nuisance in mainstream discourse, despite historical ties to effective social movements. Emphasis on mass mobilizations can render local, justice-oriented struggles (e.g., against extraction in low-income communities of color) less visible.
• Overall pattern: The recognized “youth” subject in environmental governance tends to be imagined as white, Western, middle-class; speaks in science-driven, technology-focused terms; and participates through acceptable institutional pathways, shaping who is seen and what claims/actions are legitimated.

The analysis shows that recognition in the public sphere is ambivalent: it enables youth visibility and influence while simultaneously molding youth into acceptable subject positions, speech, and action repertoires. By adopting dominant scientific discourse and future-oriented frames, youth activists gain legitimacy but risk marginalizing alternative epistemologies and present-tense justice claims from the Global South. Media logics further structure visibility, centering a narrow representation of youth that obscures intersectional diversity and local struggles. These dynamics answer the research questions by demonstrating (1) how “youth” is discursively constructed and regulated within power-laden public spheres, (2) who is included/excluded (e.g., white/Western archetypes vs. marginalized activists), and (3) how recognition is conditioned by adherence to scientific framing and institutionally sanctioned political actions. The findings underscore that calls for greater youth recognition must grapple with these structuring forces to avoid reproducing exclusions.

The paper contributes a theoretical framework, grounded in recognition theory and discourse analysis, to examine how youth are constituted as political subjects in environmental governance. Applying this to media and speech materials from formative events, the authors show that recognized youth subjectivity is often white, Western, and middle-class; privileges science-driven, technology-focused discourse; and aligns with formal political channels, which collectively condition who is heard and what actions are deemed legitimate. The study cautions that recognition can include while simultaneously shaping and restraining subjects. Future research directions include: (1) examining fractures and contingencies within power structures that allow for resistance and rearticulation of youth subjectivity; (2) assessing the evolving trajectory of Greta Thunberg’s shift toward localized civil disobedience and her efforts to amplify more diverse voices, and how this affects recognition; (3) investigating the impacts of governmental crackdowns and anti-protest laws on youth recognition and participation; and (4) expanding analyses beyond traditional media to include social media and the interplay between media spheres to better capture diverse youth activism.

The study focuses on traditional media (e.g., daily press) and selected high-profile international events, excluding social media and the interplay between traditional and new media. Findings are context-specific and not intended to be statistically generalizable. The theoretical sampling and illustrative case design prioritize conceptual refinement over representativeness. Recognition dynamics may differ across online platforms, local contexts, and other publics not analyzed here.