ACTIVATE BSR

ACTIVATE BSR tackles the growing challenge of hate speech, digital disinformation, and youth disengagement in especially rural areas of the Baltic Sea Region.

Overview

Rural areas across the Baltic Sea Region (BSR) are facing growing challenges from hate speech, disinformation and radicalisation. These threats undermine civic trust, weaken democratic institutions and risk marginalising young people’s voices. At the same time, municipalities often lack the resources, digital competences and institutional frameworks needed to meaningfully involve young people in building local resilience. While youth organisations are motivated to contribute, they often remain disconnected from local decision-making and governance processes. This gap limits communities’ capacity to respond effectively to polarisation and digital manipulation.

Existing tools for preventing hate speech and strengthening media literacy rarely combine these approaches with participatory methods that bring young people and local authorities together. The challenge is particularly pronounced in rural areas, where civic spaces and opportunities for participation are often limited, and municipalities have few opportunities to test and develop new models of cooperation. As a result, motivated young people lack structured pathways to engage, while local administrations lack practical and tested frameworks for working with them.

ACTIVATE BSR addresses this gap by equipping civil servants and youth workers with practical tools to counter disinformation, strengthen media literacy and engage young people in local governance.

Objective

The ACTIVATE BSR project aims to strengthen democratic and digital resilience in rural communities across the Baltic Sea Region by empowering youth organisations and local municipalities to work together, build shared capacities, counter disinformation and polarisation, and embed meaningful youth participation into local governance. Through co-created tools, training and locally developed resilience strategies, the project aims to foster more cohesive, inclusive and future-oriented rural communities.

Target groups

Municipalities, regional and local public authorities, NGOs, youth actors.

Outputs

The project’s core output is the ACTIVATE Manual, a practical curriculum and toolkit co-created and piloted across partner countries, providing adaptable training materials, cooperation frameworks and guidance for building stronger local resilience. It equips youth workers and civil servants with the skills and tools to counter hate speech and disinformation, strengthen intergenerational trust, and embed meaningful youth participation in local decision-making. Aligned with relevant EU and Baltic Sea Region strategies, the Manual offers a tested model for fostering inclusive governance and strengthening democratic resilience in rural communities.

Partners
  • Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS) – Lead Partner
  • Regional Youth Council of Schleswig-Holstein (Germany)
  • Estonian National Youth Council (ENL)
  • Lithuanian National Youth Council (LiJOT)
  • Baltic Sea Cultural Center (BSCC, Poland)
Duration

July 2026 – September 2028

Funding

The ACTIVATE BSR project is funded by the Interreg Baltic Sea Region programme.

Contact

Aline Mayr, Project Coordinator, ACTIVATE BSR, Phone: +46 72 030 46 65, Email: [email protected]