The youth, persons aged between 18 and 35 years are now recognized as a
category of human existence. Adults, politicians and policy wonks caricature
the youth as heirs to the future.
A dominant construct of the future is that it is unknown and out there.
The future is not out there. Neither is it an unknowable, which unfolds
inevitably. Every generation undertakes the active and deliberate vocation of
constructing the future. The recipe for the future is often contained in the
tangible and present moment, here and now.
Every generation, by its intentions, deeds or misdeeds, determine in the
present the depth of squalor or opulence of those born or unborn. In the active
and deliberate assembly of futures, the choices adults make matter. But the
proclivities and acquiescence of those currently youthful are profoundly
consequential, for they are custodians of a much longer part of the future.
Through the ages, adults have agonized about youth, characterizing them
as a boon or curse. Moreover, experts believe that if young people have no
stakes their society they may turn violent. At the launch of the Decade of
Youth Action Plan at the 17th Africa Union Summit in 2011, African
heads of state declared that unemployed youth are a threat to stability in
Africa.
Youth is more complex than the limited adult characterizations as
capital windfall or socio-political risk. Youth is new beginnings. Youth is
self-reliance, hedonism and individual liberty. Youth is juice.
Youth is nimble and full of sport. Youth is about potential, promise and
renewal Youth is about frontiers, novelty, challenging dogma and advancing the
untested. Youth is about identity exploration, self-focus and self-reliance.
Youth is about infinite possibilities and yet great uncertainty. Youth is
unfazed, finds change exhilarating, not daunting. Youth is rash, unknowable.
Youth is experimenting, boundary testing, risk-taking. Youth is on the
bleeding edge of popular culture, music, dance and fashion. Youth is on the
vanguard of technology, enterprise, creativity and innovation. Youth is the
voice of the future. Youth is about service, patriotism, peace and hope and
compassion, our highest aspirations. But Youth is also delinquency, apathy,
desperation and violence, the latent evil in all of us. End of youth is the
eternal fear of the older generation.
Three portraits emerge from this characterization: resilience and
adaptability; traditional aspirations of career, family and fulfillment; and
angst and pessimism about the future. The portraits suggest the youth are
acquiring values and attitudes they believe are demanded by society today,
rather than what is necessary to thrive in the future they want. This makes
more urgent the need to have the youth more actively engaged and participating
in the present, defining and articulating their visions of preferred futures.
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