Political Strategies for Youth Organizations

(June 24 - July 1, 2005)
By Jose Fulgencio A. Del Rosario

Jose Fulgencio Del Rosario (left) with Dr. Jorgo Chatzimarkakis, member of the parliament of the European Union and the secretary general of the FDP

Young leaders coming from Tanzania, Ghana Accra, Ghana-West Africa, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Argentina, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Macedonia, Slovak Republic, Armenia, Thailand, Malaysia, Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines came and gathered at the Villa Lessing for the 10th Liberal Youth Meeting.

It was a great experience for us participants, to have witnessed and participated in this very exemplary occasion because we understand that gathering people coming from all over the world is not that easy. Also, it was very enlightening for us to know the different situations of the different countries of origin of our fellow participants. Moreover, sharing each others opinions and ideas in certain topics is as well very educating.

The seminar covered the following subjects:

• Methodology of strategic planning
• Analysis of the components of strategic planning
• Formulation of the target image
• Selection of target groups
• Relevance and importance of Youth Organizations
• Development of strategies for implementing of youth issues in the decision making process
• Efficient participation in political parties

The three top topics that I consider interesting and worth noting are:

Formulation of the target image:

A target image describes how a party, organization or a candidate wants to be seen by most of the people. This is a very important topic because this is one factor that would make the candidate victorious.

Here, we were taught to know our people well, their needs, wants, and most importantly, the characteristics of a leader that they would prefer. Now that we have these facts, we should then portray the image that most of the people would love. Through this, we can now have the possibility to win their trust. The formulation of the target image topic was very exciting for us participants because we were made to act and maintain the image that we should portray, and so, it was nice to see the eagerness of delegates to maintain their target image. In this exercise we were not only taught about the target image but as well the discipline and the prudence to maintain it.

Development of strategies for implementing of youth issues in the decision making process:

The discussion of the tactics of Sun Tzu became one of the intelligent debates during the seminar. Sun Tzu wrote a book about political tactics and strategies for he is known as one of the experts when it comes to the political field during his time. The facilitators discussed about Sun Tzu but other delegates find Sun Tzu’s tactics irrelevant and not applicable in the present time. There are topics in Sun Tzu’s book that is very interesting. Like the terrains for example, some of which were applicable and we really learned from it, though some were irrelevant.

Efficient participation in political parties:

In this topic, we interestingly discussed that the potential in the entire election area depends wholly on the degree of coalitions and alliances. We transformed weaknesses into timed- action-plans. Then, each group formulated objectives that we put in the checklist and discussed it in the plenary.

Each group was made to make a time-action-plan showing the tactical unit, objective, and the target group. This activity was very challenging as we knew different political strategies of different environment.

Overview of the seminar:

I arrived in Villa Lessing at around 3pm of June 24, 2005. When, I got there I already felt a happy and friendly environment. Everyone greets everybody. From there, everyone started to make friends already. Since, there was no formal session yet, we decided to go to the city center to have a view of Saarbrucken. I was with the delegates from Macedonia, Guatemala, Israel, and Thailand. They were my first few friends. Dinner came, and there we formally met most of the delegates. We were introduced to each other and started to make friends. Some of us were curious with the food because there were a lot of berries on it. Since, we were not really exposed to German food; we asked a lot of questions regarding what it’s made of and what the taste is. Eventually, after tasting it we really enjoyed our food that we kept on looking forward for meal times. On the other hand, the accommodation was really an A+. Our rooms were cozy and cool, the bathroom was clean, there was a 24-hour Internet access and most importantly, the staff was really friendly. So, what more can we ask for? After dinner, the director of the International Academy for Leadership, Mr. Jorg Dehnert together with his facilitating team, Hon. Wulf Pabst and Ms. Natalia Peral, welcomed us. We then shared a couple of glasses of beer along with chitchats, which eventually made us closer to each other. On the second day, the formal plenary session started and there we witnessed a lot of intelligent discussions and debates. We had a lot of exercises that made the seminar livelier. We were formed into groups and so the competition from different groups is really noticeable, but then, it was a healthy competition. What I like about the seminar is that when it comes to session time, everyone is very attentive and idealistic, that they fearlessly deliver their opinions. But after the plenary, no one really takes it personally even if they had contradicting ideas. This is the kind of environment that I like. I think it is in this way that we can learn more. The facilitators were very skilled and experienced when it comes to liberal politics. One of the facilitators, Hon. Wulf Pabst, is a councilor himself in one of the municipalities in Germany. He speaks very good English and so there was really no problem with us understanding him. Also, he is an excellent photographer! We were able to meet Dr. Jorgo Chatzimarkakis, a member of the parliament of the European Union and also the secretary general of FDP. There, he enlightened us with his ideas and experiences on liberal politics. We were also able to meet Mr. Christoph Hartmann, a member of the parliament of Saarland State and also the chairman of the FDP. After the meetings with this VIPs we continued our seminar proper. Excursion day came and everyone was excited to visit the site of the World War 1 in Verdun, France. We went there and indeed, we felt the feeling of being in war when we saw the ruins and the tunnels. We then visited Metz, an old town in France where in we had a chance to shop and relax after days of brainstorming. This was also an opportunity for us to bond and be closer to each other. We were like a group of long time friends despite the fact that we just met a few days ago. After the excursion, we again continued with our seminar. To strengthen the bonding, the group decided to play football. There we knew the football addicts and you can really tell where they came from. Most of the football experts were from the Central America. When the last day came, you can really feel the sadness in each one of us, as we are about to say goodbye to our fellow delegates that we already consider as our brothers and sisters. We got so close to each other that it was really hard for us to say goodbye. In compensation, we exchanged numbers and created a group in the net so we can keep in touch with each other.

Lastly, each one of us is very thankful to the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for giving us an opportunity to further explore our leadership skills and abilities. Also, the chance to meet people from the different parts of the world is definitely incomparable. With the knowledge that we have gained in the seminar, we believe that step-by-step we can truly make this world a better place to live in. Now that we are equipped with knowledge and experience on liberal politics, we are now ready to promote liberalism and eventually make this world liberal!