Voluntary Services in Sports Day: Promoting Democracy and Youth Participation in Germany

Voluntary services in sport are beneficial not only to mainly young people as well as sports clubs and associations, but also to society as a whole. To further publicize the relevance of this successful project, which has been growing steadily for more than twenty years, and to further develop it, decision-makers in politics and sports, especially many young people, coming together today for the “Voluntary Services in Sports Day”. The German Sports Youth (dsj) and the Sports Youth in the North Rhine-Westphalia State Sports Association have taken over the organization of the German Sports and Olympic Museum in Cologne.

Under the motto “Youth participation as a motor to promote democracy”, current and former volunteer service providers, guests from the political sector, representatives from the practice sites and representatives from all sports sponsoring organizations from all over Germany exchanging ideas in Cologne. The focus is on the question of democratic education, which basically determines the assumption of activities in sports clubs and schools, seminar work or work as volunteer speakers.

At the event, Bundestag member Dieter Stier (CDU/CSU) and state parliament member Dagmar Hanses (Alliance 90/The Greens) will shed light on the role of voluntary services for a democratic and solidarity-based society from a political perspective. Marie Beimen, Nelly Schrader and Leandra Götz speak for the successful campaign “Strengthening Volunteer Service”. They have had a decisive impact on the national campaign, which collected more than 100,000 signatures last year and was approved by the Petitions Committee with the highest vote. As former volunteers, they report on their own experiences and political actions with the aim of strengthening voluntary service and thus show how voluntary service can participate promote political.

“Around 100,000 young people are already involved in voluntary work, around 4,000 of them in sports alone. Today we emphasize their contribution to democracy in many ways. To attract even more people to volunteering, volunteering needs to be attractive and open to entry so that as many people have the opportunity to get involved in themselves and our society,” a confirmed Jens Wortmann, chairman of the Sportjugend NRW.

Julian Lagemann, who is responsible for the topic of voluntary service on the dsj board, said: “Instead of talking about compulsory service or a year of service, we need a right to voluntary service, ie a real right to service for everyone. This is particularly true with the upcoming funding cuts in the voluntary services budget 2025, which currently makes improvements to the voluntary services framework impossible. We will continue to strive for a successful voluntary service project!”