Youth Empowerment And Self Employment

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As a young person in the 21st century, I find it very difficult to understand why there is such a resistance, be it conscious or subconscious, to including youth in our major socio-economic and development institutions. According to a UNDP report entitled Enhancing Youth Political Participation throughout the Electoral Cycle published in 2012, people between the ages of 15 and 25 represent one-fifth of the world’s population. However, the average age of parliamentarians globally is 53. If such a substantial percentage of the world’s population is below the age of 25, why isn’t this reflected in our “institutions of change”?
If we want to promote safe, sustainable and productive society, we have to stop punishing youth with narratives that cite them as “the root of all our problems.” Unfortunately, a lot of the time, young people feel that it doesn’t matter what they do, because when they aren’t being chastised for being “lazy” or “complacent,” they are usually being undermined by development rhetoric that makes them feel like an unwelcome nuisance. We have to stop referring to the future of the MENA region as a “youth bulge” or a “public policy challenge,” especially when their desire to be impact-driven leaders isn’t being welcomed or rewarded by most of our social and economic institutions.
If we aren’t creating institutions, policies and narratives that enable our youth to become the leader of future. What are we doing? The widespread inclusion of youth in the MENA region, and beyond, can no longer be a point of contention or debate. The youth of today are the citizens, business leaders and social influencers of tomorrow, and if we are not empowering them to join our social, political and economic frameworks, then we are condemning these institutions to failure and irrelevance. Regardless of whether you’re an innovator in the startup world or the corporate world, we all have a responsibility as a community to “activate” our youth, and use their “abundance” to drive our social and economic growth.

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