Youth and Governance

A paper for a pre-ADF symposium

Jean Ives Bonzi
October 2004
Programme Advisor/ Support Unit for Youth Movements

The African Child Policy Forum/ ACPF

Introduction

The concepts of both youth and governance continue to generate intense debate in terms of their meanings. However an attempt will be made to define these broad concepts in an attempt to define the scope of this presentation.

The presentation explores legislative measures, policies and programmes that in the past have addressed youth issues related to good governance in Africa. Although the majority of the available literature is on global or regional action plans, there exist some best practices at national level, from which some key lessons can be learnt. The terms "youth" and "governance" are both fluid, and contain diversities within each of them, in terms of both practical application and theoretical definition. This complexity highlights the need for a clear understanding at all forums such as the ADF symposium.

Arguably, defining principles of "youth" are suggested as being age bound, psychological and socio-economic in nature whereas the principles defining "governance" in general are suggested to be political, economic and corporate in nature. This paper will however focus more on political governance in relation to the demographic bonus that the African youth constitute as being a prerequisite for good economic and corporate governance.

The linkage between the two concepts is two-fold. On the one hand, governance appears to be a way of delivering services to the youth, e.g. education, health, employment, etc. This requires that projects and programs be properly formulated and ultimately youth-sensitive. On the other hand, young people are a major component of society and a huge security threat to the sustenance of effective governance. Therefore should be active participants in the process of governance. Therefore the process of searching ways to improve governance in Africa should meaningfully involve the youth, given that current style of governance mostly impacts on future generations.

The first paragraph despite the controversies, attempts short definitions of the terminologies relating to youth and governance; the second paragraph looks at youth unemployment, the third paragraph looks at youth education and health, recommendations are made across the document.

Definition

Youth: The age in which a person is considered a "youth," and thus eligible for special treatment under the law varies around the world. Commonly, a youth is defined as being somewhere between age 12 and age 25, with different countries and regions choosing more narrow or broad definitions. In Africa the age limit for youth goes up to 35 in certain countries.

Youth services are an array of services (counseling, health, recreation, informal education, job preparation, etc) designed either to support young people during adolescence or to address specific problems faced by young people in particular contexts.

Youth service is broadly defined as a set of organized activities in which young people participate to benefit others. It contributes positively to the community and society in general, and provides opportunities for reflection (e.g. an organization where young people are recruited, offered leadership opportunities, participate in activities that improve the community, and are trained and mentored). Generally work is done for minimal or no compensation.

Youth rights: refers to a set of philosophies intended to enhance civil rights for young people. Youth rights organizers seek to enhance the role of young people in society through equal rights, rejecting the paternalism of the current regime as a hindrance to those young people who seek active participation in society.

Civil rights are those legal rights granted to citizens by the government.

Governance:

Exploring governance in Africa and the linkage to youth issues requires examining the different political and traditional governance settings. There are some studies that look at the different traditional systems of governance in Africa, but there tends to be little focus on the role of youth in these settings. One of the principle reasons for this is that in many African contexts, traditional structures such as tribes and clans are very strong and powerful. It is high time to look at the role youth are playing in these structures on the one hand and the impact of these structures on youth and youth development and empowerment on the other hand. This point is very obvious within political structures which provide virtually no space for youth involvement in terms decision and policy making.

The other angle of the analysis is with regards to the influence of the youth on the level of state governance. While we recognize the limited capacities of governments, access to influencing of policies around service delivery for instance remains a big challenge. According to the World Bank distance learning programme to youth, the basic work of government is to provide services, make laws, and enforce these laws. This work is generally carried out in three branches of the government: the executive (advise on policy decisions, carry out government programmes) the legislative (make laws, represent citizen) and the judicial (enforces law). Such strategies of exclusion by governance systems tend to justify the actions of perpetrators of violence who are mostly young people as they continue to be denied opportunity and space to express themselves and also to begin to build the requisite skills for social responsibility. With a culture that provides very little communicative space for the development of young people, violence becomes a way of life.

YOUTH & CONFLICT: At this point in my presentation, I would like to spend a few minutes looking at the issue of Youth and conflict in Africa. Though this phenomenon has its roots in issues of unemployment, education and other socio-economic factors, it continues to generate a huge security threat in the continent. African youth are the major groups contributing to the ongoing conflicts and potential conflicts in Africa and are also among the main victims of these violent conflicts and wars. However, youth are not taking any part in any official processes addresses these conflicts. There are some third track fragmented and poorly coordinated youth initiatives which do not have influence on the major processes at all levels (conflict resolution, peace building and Disarmament, demobilization and reintegration processes). E.g. of such situations can be found in Sierra Leone, Sudan, Northern Uganda

YOUTH & EDUCATION

Education is at the core of youth development and growth. It determines to a large extent the way youths behave, act or perceive their world. However, education propgrammes in most African countries continue to focus more on knowledge and very little on skills development and are not context-relevant. This perpetuates the culture of dependence as a lot of young people come out of schools disempowered. On another level, the education sector continues to suffer from high levels of corruption, mismanagement and hence lack of adequate resources. Efforts to build strong education programmes are still to be made in Africa. Facilities for training and educating West Africa's youths are woefully inadequate. Many of the existing ones are dilapidating.

Youth and unemployment

The normal scene in various African countries is the high rates of unemployment this often due to many reasons such as the lack of planning and capacity to absorb the youth or develop their potentials.

To explore this further it is important to look at this issue from different angles, starting with what is existing in African laws and legislations and are they coherent with the global human rights standards and the protection available. It is also important to look at the labor laws in the African countries, the rights to work, the policies imposed by multinational companies, the exploitations and the denial for equal access opportunities to compete - due to high levels of corruption, nepotism and lack of transparency.

When policy vacuums restrain the tackling of youth related issues, youth unemployment find a ground to rise. Very few African countries have designed a youth policy. Examples are South Africa, Ghana, Sierra Leone. As a result, youth employment is diluted in vague and general national programmes in which youth related problems are not addressed. In countries where legislative measures and youth policies are in place, they have yet to be enforced or implemented.

Another important issue is the role of the African continental and regional structures (e.g. African Union, regional economic groupings) in promoting access to youth and protecting youth right for employment. Their role is very crucial as they are integrated within planning mechanisms for development and for setting priorities in Africa, such as NEPAD, Human Security Initiatives and other economic interventions.

From an article of an Ethiopian newspaper, the Sub-Saharan Informer of October 1^st: titled: Reflections of the Extraordinary Summit of the AU on Employment and poverty alleviation SSI, Ms. Etta Tadess , the UNFPA representative to AU and UNECA says "Employment is and must be about lifting people out of dependency and charity".

Taking into consideration ongoing policies at governmental level in Africa, providing means for the youth to create jobs and innovative legal ways of generating income to allow them make a living should be a focus. This small scale development for youths could also be a complementary strategy to addressing the larger issues of economic stability for the whole continent. To this end, a proper framework (social, legal and policy formulation) should be established. Examples could be found from Ghana and Cape Town in South Africa where city councils is running programmes that facilitate youth access to services. These programmes still need to be developed to fix the shortcomings in order to reach good applicable models that could be adapted to various contexts within Africa.

How can the youth participate? (Recommendation)

Employment policies are to be for and done with the youth. In countries where the government has played the role of job provider in public service, consequences have been disastrous for the youth, especially when the growing number of job seekers have become overwhelming. The government's role should go beyond providing jobs; more importantly it should consist in facilitating and creating the environment for job creation. The youths become therefore active participants in job creation rather than recipients of ready-made jobs that are usually scarce. The private sector becomes a favorable terrain for job creation and consumption.

To facilitate this process, youth groups and organizations should also initiate the engagement in the processes of policy making and the protection of their employment rights by maintaining a constructive dialogue among themselves and with policy makers.

HEALTH:

According to the UNAIDS report: At The Crossroads: Accelerating Youth Access to HIV/AIDS Interventions, "Young people have the right to health, education and a decent standard of living. To fulfil these rights, young people must have youth-friendly information, skills and services for the prevention, treatment and care of HIV and AIDS. However, the evidence tells us that still many young people do not have access to these interventions"

Preventing and mitigating vulnerability

Young people are diverse. Interventions must be tailored to meet their individual characteristics, such as age, sex, marital status and domicile, and the many deep-rooted structural, social and other contextual issues that make young people vulnerable (gender relations, race, religion, socioeconomic status).

Interventions should also specifically target vulnerable and high-risk groups of young people who are often at the centre of HIV transmission, especially in countries with concentrated epidemics.

" Access to health facilities and education around health issues is one of the big challenges in Africa. The emergence of diseases such as polio is a big threat to youth in Africa and common diseases like malaria, hepatitis, tuberculosis and HIV AIDS are major threats to African youth development. The lack of resources to combat or alleviate these diseases is resulting in high mortality rates among youth in Africa and short life expectancies which deprive the continent from one of its main resources - the youth and brings about huge burdens on families and other social units. Fortunately, these diseases were listed on the top of the African leaders NEPAD agenda. Stronger policies are hopefully to be developed around these issues." At the Crossroads: Accelerating Youth Access to HIV/AIDS Interventions

Many UN agencies and tasks force as the UNAIDS Inter-agency Task Team on Young People c/o UNFPA HIV/AIDS Branch have produce resourceful material around youth health issues. The same report At the Crossroads: Accelerating Youth Access to HIV/AIDS Interventions states that " HIV has a young face"

• Every day, an estimated 5,000-6,000 young people aged 15-24 become infected with HIV.
• Globally, almost one-fourth of those living with HIV are under the age of 25.
• Of the 15-24 year old young people living with HIV, 63% live in sub-Saharan Africa and 21% live in Asia-Pacific.

Good practices identified by the UNAIDS report

• Interventions through schools:
• Interventions through health services:
• Interventions through communities:
• Interventions through the media:
• Policies as an intervention:

The need to scale up efforts: What it will take

Only a committed, scaled-up response will meet the urgent needs of young people. Efforts aimed at young people, and implemented together with young people, must become a priority in each region, country, and community. Actions can, and should, be taken today.

Scaling up what works

• Implement a combination of interventions in order to meet the diverse needs and different groups of young people. There is evidence that involving peers in programmes can provide gains in knowledge.
• Utilize schools and media, which are particularly effective and acceptable channels, for providing young people with life saving information. Use culturally appropriate and age-specific communication avenues.
• Link effective interventions whenever possible and appropriate (e.g. schools, services and mass media).
• Rapidly expand effective pilot projects to reach national coverage, and sustain effective large scale programmes for, and by, young people.
• Information: Young people have the right to know about HIV and AIDS and how to protect themselves. It is important to provide this information to young people, both in and out of school and ideally before they become sexually active and/or use drugs. The full range of prevention options must be given for young people, covering the diversity of their sexual and substance abuse-related behaviours. A combination behavioural change approach includes encouragement of delay in sexual debut, reduction in the number of sexual partners, and correct and consistent condom use.
• Skills: Life skills-based HIV/AIDS information and education enable young people to make empowered choices and decisions about their health. It is important that these skills focus not just on developing healthylifestyles, but also on sexual health issues such as negotiating abstinence and condom use, and avoiding substance abuse.
• Youth-friendly health services: Providing young people with access to youth-friendly health services, such as voluntary counselling and treatment (VCT), early diagnosis and treatment of sexually transmitted infections and/or drug dependence, and anti-retroviral therapy is essential. Young people should also have access to preventive commodities, such as condoms (male and female) and clean needles and syringes.
• Creating a safe and supportive environment:

In order to effectively receive the information, skills and services, young people need to be provided with an environment in which they are safe from harm, supported through caring and close relations with families, and have opportunities for individual development. Policies and social norms also influence young people's vulnerability to HIV.

UNAIDS Inter-agency Task Team on Young People c/o UNFPA HIV/AIDS Branch is composed of : International Labour Organization, United Nations Children's Fund, United Nations Development Programme, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, United Nations Population Fund, World Bank, World Health Organization.

Conclusion:

In the 21st century we need to bring back the sense of solidarity and it is likely that training will be one of the main pathways toward developing the economy of solidarity. How can this be done?

The first strategy would be to help people acknowledge the problems existing in society. One way of doing this would be for curricula to engage students and youth in general with social problems. Solidarity can only be inculcated if social problems are acknowledged and if solutions are seen as being in the hands of the people as well as the government. Second, it is necessary to refocus the traditional pattern of Social Service and to get young people more involved in addressing social disparities.