Igniting Youth Action: The Integrity Leaders of Today and Tomorrow

The corrupt are fast to exploit any weakness in our systems — but time and again youth-led groups and movements that are committed to integrity have found ways to thwart their plans and shift the balance of power.

This track will showcase the young people who are reshaping the fight against corruption and encourage further alliances with civil society, businesses, governments, entrepreneurs and communities to ensure a future of integrity. We will co-design bold, future-ready strategies that shift the balance from corrupt to integrity-led systems.

• Integrity First: How Gen Z Is Reframing Anti-Corruption to Unlock the SDGs

  Young people increasingly view corruption not only as a governance challenge, but as one of the greatest barriers to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This interactive workshop brings together youth leaders, policymakers, civil society representatives, and private sector actors to reframe corruption through a sustainable development lens and co-design actionable pathways for integrating youth-led integrity solutions into development strategies. Participants will also explore and discuss the findings of the first-ever Youth Corruption Perception Index, offering fresh insights into how young people perceive corruption and its impact on development.

  Coordinated by Youth Against Corruption (YAC Foundation)

  Featuring Organización Iberoamericana de Juventud (OIJ) to the United Nations (Secretary General of the Council of Global Change), XAKSIA, TRACODA, Transparency International Secretariat (TI-S), Youth Against Corruption (YAC Foundation) & Gen Z Movement LATAM and ICY Ambassador

• Play to Win: Gaming in the Public Interest

  Civil society and investigative outlets must reach broader audiences, especially younger generations. OCCRP’s Floodlight Gaming gives game developers access to investigative reporting about organized crime & corruption to adapt into interactive media experiences. This panel will explore the intersection between civil society’s goals & strategies & the video gaming industry.

  Coordinated by The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP)

  Featuring Pulitzer Center, The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and Polyvale Studios and “Dark Money” game developer

• From Stories to Action: Can Young Creators Hold Power Accountable?

  IACC COLPIN SESSION

  This panel explores how young content creators are transforming investigative journalism into powerful tools for civic engagement and accountability across Latin America and Africa. Drawing on the Pulitzer Center full model, it will showcase how creators collaborate with journalists to translate complex investigations into compelling stories that reach new audiences and spark dialogue, participation, and action. Featuring perspectives from youth movements, content creation specialists, and the Pulitzer Center’s engagement team, the discussion will explore how these collaborations can connect communities with decision-makers, amplify underrepresented voices, and move journalism beyond the headlines—from stories to dialogue, and from dialogue to action.

  Coordinated by Pulitzer Center

  Featuring Pulitzer Center, Waki Ambienta and Africa Ecological Transition Cluster

• Integrity by Design: Re-Engineering Youth Programs to Prevent Corruption Before It Starts.

  In many African countries, youth programs are weakened by corruption, nepotism and weak institutions. High unemployment and poverty put pressure on limited opportunities, making favoritism more likely. This panel will explore how to redesign youth programs to be inclusive, transparent and youth-centred, while embedding integrity safeguards that respond to real youth needs.

  Aims and Objectives
  To examine how youth programs across Africa can be structurally redesigned to prevent capture by favoritism and political influence, and to equip participants with practical, replicable integrity tools that embed prevention into program design from the outset.

  Coordinated by MUN Impact Nigeria

  Featuring MUN Impact Nigeria, CONIG UNODC, Accountability Lab Liberia, Nigerian Youth Parliament, ZimBit Solutions and Kenya Ethics Ambassadors Network (EAN-K)

• Niñas y jóvenes construyendo democracias libres de corrupción

  Strengthen the understanding and action of anti-corruption actors, the business sector, and civil society regarding the strategic role of girls’ and young women’s leadership, through a gender-responsive approach, in fostering cultures of integrity from an early age that contribute to more transparent and resilient democratic and economic systems.

  Coordinated by Centro de Investigación para la Acción Femenina

  Featuring Centro de Investigación para la Acción Femenina

• From Exclusion to Action: Empowering Youth to Combat Corruption and Discrimination in Education and Health Services

  Putting forward youth-led solutions to corruption challenges impeding inclusive access to education and health services, the workshop seeks to:

  • Highlight the gendered and discriminatory impact of corruption on access to education and health services, especially for marginalised groups;
  • Share youth-led initiatives aimed at promoting transparency and accountability in public services.

  Coordinated by Transparency International

  Featuring Besa Global, TI Global Health Programme, YouthKommunity.org, Education Specialist and Activist, UNDP and ASJ (TI Honduras)

• Youth as Anti-Corruption Disruptors: The New Accountability Generation

  Panel participants will examine why and how youth-led accountability movements are emerging simultaneously across diverse political, economic, and social contexts. The discussion will explore how technology is enabling ideas, tactics, and symbols to spread across borders, and how innovative forms of nonviolent resistance—including satire, tactical whimsy, meme culture, and digital organizing strategies—are fostering decentralized, acephalous youth accountability movements that challenge corruption, democratic backsliding, and declining public trust. In turn, these approaches are expanding civic participation, reshaping public discourse, strengthening transnational solidarity, and advancing public accountability. Illustrative examples will include India’s Cockroach Janta Party, Nepal’s One Piece pirate flag protests, Kenya’s WanTam movement, and Morocco’s GenZ 212.

  Coordinated by School of International Service The American University

• From Protest to Power

  Panel participants will examine how governments and public institutions have responded to youth-led accountability movements, assessing why some movements have resulted in legislative reforms, strengthened oversight, constitutional reforms, government transitions, and greater institutional accountability, while others have been met with cooption, symbolic concessions, civic space restrictions, or repression. The discussion will examine the degree to which reforms are genuine versus token measures and how governments have attempted to counter youth-led accountability movements. Institutional methods of cooption, deflection, and absorption will be discussed alongside repressive measures, such as censorship, surveillance, and the criminalization of dissent. The panel will also explore how the acephalous nature of many youth-led movements has shaped government responses. Lessons learned from countries where youth mobilization has influenced public policy, parliamentary representation, constitutional reforms, government transitions, and accountability will be highlighted.

  Coordinated by School of International Service The American University