Jorge Herrera Valderrabbano
Pronouns: He/They
Organisation: Ágora México
Country of origin: Mexico
Profile
Jorge Herrera Valderrabbano is a peacebuilder from Mexico City, Mexico. Their interest in advocacy stems from their teenage years and was shaped by experiences of growing up in a region with societal issues, such as inequalities, lack of access to healthcare, lack of employment and the war on drugs. They majored in International Relations and Social Work, and studied Political Economy at New York University. Since then, they have been living in New York City. Their work initially focused on drug and disarmament policy reforms, but over time, their attention shifted to more personal topics such as youth participation in advocacy and LGBTQ+ issues. This shift made Jorge even more passionate about their work, and now they use every opportunity to talk about advocacy. They consider themselves a full-time activist, and they believe that advocacy work also helped them grow as a person, all while helping others.
Jorge participated in the founding of Ágora México, an organisation that originally started as a blog, to help and identify youth-led initiatives, support them in growth and bring them together with stakeholders capable of providing financial support. With the help of this organisation, they created a local youth municipality, something that Jorge is very proud of, as they can see the fruit of their work.
Story
Jorge Herrera Valderrabbano said their hard work and that of their colleagues has helped Ágora México successfully evolve into a civil society organisation specialised in collaborations with other local organisations. Their projects include a partnership with the regional municipality to create a local youth council and focus on enhancing youth involvement in other policies. They also organised a panel discussion at an ECOSOC forum with speakers from the United Network of Young Peacebuilders (UNOY) and the Minister of Foreign Affairs Mexico. Jorge said they are very proud of being appointed Regional Coordinator for America at the United Nations of Young Peacebuilders.
Jorge said Ágora México faces many difficulties, including a lack of funding. This means not only that all ten team members work on a voluntary basis, but that sometimes they cannot ensure sufficient funding for their future projects. This is partially due to the difficulty of finding and convincing investors about the reliability of a youth organisation due to prevalent stereotypes about young people. However, they are also aware of the fact that certain issues, such as LGBTQ+ topics and sexual and reproductive health, are significantly harder to find investors for. They said that in that realm, youth peacebuilding appears as a noble cause that also functions as a hook for investors, especially in Mexico’s current political climate. Jorge said this is important because they believe that through the public sector’s funds and policy reforms, they can reach more people.
Jorge said another challenge is the apathy of young people. Jorge plans to tackle this by improving their social media presence to better engage the youth. They believe that authenticity – especially in the case of social media activism – is key to building a successful online outreach and to promoting youth engagement. Jorge said they sometimes struggle with being a leading figure in an organisation, as it is difficult when speaking for their organisation unaccompanied, to authentically represent everyone involved.
Jorge said there are four important steps for anyone who wants to start their own organisation. These same steps originate from a book Jorge read and are also applied in the youth workshops Ágora México organises. First, you have to analyse your context and see what your community needs. Then, you need to create your group of people who are going to help you and participate in your organisation. Third, you have to set your goals and your way of achieving it, while keeping the target groups and the social context in mind. Lastly, you have to build alliances in order to create visibility for your organisation and have a supportive network with like-minded people from other organisations.
Published in 2026