This article examines children’s political agency in the context of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest. The Eurovision Song Contest is widely recognized as a political arena—a space for nation branding and soft diplomacy, narratives of European musical and democratic harmony, and protests over global political events. But despite filling similar roles to their adult counterparts, the young performers’ age and the organizers’ emphasis on ensuring the event is safe and fun mean these dynamics are frequently downplayed or overlooked at Junior Eurovision, with significant consequences for how we understand children’s political and politicized roles in international cultural spaces. I work with Lauren Berlant’s concepts of genre and the juxtapolitical to argue that recognition of children’s political—as opposed to artistic—agency by adults is tempered by both the format of Eurovision as entertainment and by broader conceptions apparent in international discourses of children as apolitical innocents. I suggest that while each of these genres can work separately to quiet the political dimensions of events, issues, and identities, it is Junior Eurovision’s double-edged status as a spectacular musical event and one starring and aimed at children that keeps the young performers from being recognized as having political identities and agency twice over.

中文翻译：

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“发挥创意、交朋友、分享文化体验”：欧洲青年歌唱大赛的流派、政治和乐趣

本文探讨了欧洲少年歌唱大赛背景下儿童的政治能动性。欧洲歌唱大赛被广泛认为是一个政治舞台——一个国家品牌和软外交、欧洲音乐和民主和谐叙事以及对全球政治事件抗议的空间。然而，尽管年轻表演者的角色与成年表演者相似，但他们的年龄和组织者对确保活动安全和有趣的重视意味着这些动态在欧洲少年电视网经常被淡化或忽视，这对我们如何理解儿童的政治和生活产生了重大影响。国际文化空间中的政治化角色。我研究劳伦·伯兰特（Lauren Berlant）的流派和并列政治概念，认为成年人对儿童政治（而非艺术）能动性的认可受到欧洲电视网作为娱乐的形式以及国际话语中将儿童视为非政治无辜者的更广泛概念的影响。 。我认为，虽然这些流派中的每一种都可以单独发挥作用，以平息事件、问题和身份的政治层面，但少年欧洲电视网作为一项壮观的音乐活动和一个以儿童为主角并针对儿童的活动的双刃地位，阻止了年轻表演者两次被承认具有政治身份和代理权。