National, UN, and agency youth policies: Looking critically at commitments, impacts, and intersections with youth participation and critique

• In Event: Youth and civic development

Proposal

Countries may define their youth population as anywhere between 13-35 and within this span, subgroups may be recognized. Over 50 percent of 198 countries have National Youth Policies (NYPs) and more countries are creating them. The United Nations and USAID create intersecting policy, and importantly, youth organizations and foundations are providing information and critique of policies in various platforms. Youth policies help to create the needed framework and conditions to promote young people and implement their rights. These policies may intersect with education sector goals within and among countries and are relevant to comparative analysis and discussion and the sustainability of a vibrant, educated, and healthy youth population. Youth participation and critique of policies is also essential to this discussion.

The sheer number of youth that exists, in some developing countries over 50 percent of the population, creates a Demographic Dividend—an opportunity and a challenge (USAID First Youth in Development Policy). NYPs are generally part of a country’s overall welfare policy and include the ways and means through which youth are educated, encouraged, nurtured, and aided financially, and monitored as a positive subgroup of a nation and its progress. The policy structure might be by sector or integrated but with the goal of providing a comprehensive view of the situation of young people, the government measures which affect or target youth, and how to guide the development of youth based on life situations that transcend sector boundaries. Gender equality is often a pervasive goal. The USAID Youth policy calls for systematic, cross-sectoral goals that strategically orient development goals. One paramount aspect of the USAID policy which has also emerged as central to NYPs and other policies and is demanded by youth organizations is the mainstreaming of “youth in development”, thus requiring their participation—“investing in programs by, with, and for youth.”
Currently, several websites supply an abundance of information about NYPs and youth in policy and programs including www.youthpolicy.org; www.coe.int/en/web/youth/national-youth-policies; www.un.org/development/desa/youth/what-we-do/what-can-you-do/formulate-national-youth-policies.html. These sites are maintained by both youth groups and agencies. For instance, the UN site provides guidance for creating NYPs. The youth sites provide data about countries’ NYPs, keep their audience up-to-date on new developments, and offer critique which can be linked to goals of recognizing diversity and progressivism in emphasizing speaking truth to the power of governments or unilateral organizations.

Recent news promotes the second edition of the Youth Wellbeing Index(YWI), by the International Youth Foundation which measures the multidimensional aspects of youth wellbeing in 30 countries across the globe. This 2017 version adds the essential domain of gender equality, updates the indicators used, and includes new data sources. New opinion data from the 2016 Global Millennial Viewpoints Survey is also used. An article on www.youthpolicy.org discusses in the YWI, “methodological changes, their implications for measuring youth wellbeing and youth data globally – and what all this means for youth policy”.

These youth platforms are both reactive and proactive in helping youth and assisting and empowering youth to work in articulating, studying, and solving the issues that they see as most relevant and important to them. However, as these numerous websites and other platforms analyze and critique existing policy and the commitments and impacts of the broader community, they are also questioning the efforts and realities of youth and their own youth groups. One such question posed is “Why does the global youth sector fool itself with commitments it fails to live up to?” (http://www.youthpolicy.org/).

Exploring these issues of NYPs, youth policy, and youth voices within them is salient for continued progress in all sectors for youth in countries as well as internationally as some policies seek to scale up best approaches across countries. Several NYPs such as from India, Ghana, and Sweden, and the USAID policy will provide content for this discussion. Implications for both policy and practice exist as countries acknowledge more contributions of their youth in articulating and helping to solve issues that affect themselves. These policies and youth websites and critique have not been explored in an intersectional way; therefore, this discussion will provide not a linear dialogue but rather a horizontal one in which different perspectives prevail.

Author

• Sandra L Stacki, Hofstra University