Meaningful and inclusive youth engagement have significant benefits for both youths, adults, communities, countries, and the world in general. Yet, what we often see is the deliberate or unintentional tokenisation of young people when it comes to their engagement or participation in decision-making. We have had cases of organisations and donors organising programs and projects, which they claim is geared towards promoting youth inclusion, youth empowerment, and even youth participation. Yet, at the end of the day, what we see is something different. At times, invitations are sent out to young people to attend youth programs but nothing is done during such events to actually engage them. Furthermore, their needs and concerns are rarely addressed in most of these meetings, making their attendance something of a formality rather than a necessity.
Thus, in the absence of meaningful and inclusive youth engagement, what will happen is that other people keep making decisions for young people without actually considering their aspirations, needs, and wants. For sustainable peace and development to occur, there is therefore the need for individuals, governments, organisations, and donors to engage young people in a manner that is mutually beneficial, while also providing them with a safe and inclusive space to lend their voice on societal issues. In this article, I will be providing some insights on tokenism, how to know when youths are being tokenism, the importance of meaningful and inclusive youth engagement (MIYE), as well as some practical recommendations on how that can be achieved in all stages of the project cycle.
Tokenism and Barriers to Meaningful and Inclusive Youth Engagement
The Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (2010) defines tokenism as the act of doing something only in order to do what the law requires or to satisfy a particular group of people, but not in a way that is really sincere e.g. appointing one woman to the otherwise all-male staff could look like tokenism. Tokenising young people means engaging them just for show or putting them in positions of authority, without actually giving them power to influence decision. Tokenising youths only helps to reinforce existing power differentials and social norms, which does not bode well for anyone in the end.
The United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 2250 on Youth, Peace, and Security (YPS) recognises and acknowledges the positive contributions of young people to promoting and maintaining international peace and security. It urges member states to consider ways to increase inclusive representation of youth in decision-making at all levels in local, national, regional and international institutions and mechanisms for the prevention and resolution of conflict. The resolution also encouraged them to consider establishing integrated mechanisms for meaningful participation of youth in peace processes and dispute-resolution.
Meaningful and inclusive young engagement involves equitable power sharing between and among stakeholders, where each side seeing the other as equal partner and leaders, rather than young people been seen just as beneficiaries. It means empowering young people as decision makers, thus allowing them to define their own engagement. Meaningfully engaging young people entails collaborating and co-creating with young people instead of simply making rules for them to follow. However, as young people, we often encounter challenges with individuals, government institutions, donors and organisations alike especially when it comes to involving young people in all stages of the project cycle, particularly with planning and design. We’ve seen countless number of cases where issues concerning young people are being talked about and deliberated by adults without consulting the youths themselves. There are also occasion where young people are only interacted with on issues that they feel are youth issues, forgetting that all issues are youth issues and that young people should be the chance to decide for themselves, which issues is vital for them to engage in.
I will be using a personal experience to share on some barriers that we have encountered with donors concerning meaningful and inclusive youth engagement. A while back, a donor came into our community to implement a youth economic empowerment project because they noticed that they was an increased rate of crime in the community. They provided financial support/business startup funds for about 500 young people in the community because they believe that young people in this community resort to violent activities because they are not gainfully employed. The project lasted for about three months after which they left. Months later, the crime continued, with increased armed robbery attack and even loss of lives and properties in some areas. You may ask, what went wrong? Where did the donors go wrong that the project fail to yield the desired result?
The answer is that the donors did not listen neither did they give ownership to young people to determine the solution to the problem. The donor came into that community with their own assumption and conclusion on the cause of the problem and the way forward rather than listening to young people within the community. If they had listened to young people living in the community and those involved, they would have discovered that the issue in the community was not necessary tied to economic reasons but was mainly quest for power between two cult groups. In such situations, the best solution might have simply been about facilitating dialogue between the two groups. However, their intervention was based on assumptions and generalisation informed probably by their experience elsewhere, rather than on consultation with those on the ground.
Practical Recommendations for Meaningful and Inclusive Youth Engagement
One practical recommendation that I will give to donors and organisations is to engage with the many faces of young people because the perspective of one young person will not tell the whole story. It is tokenism when one youth or a particular group of young people are expected to represent all youth. Donors/organisations should realise that youths are not a homogenous group and that there is no one-sized solution to addressing the challenges faced by young people because they have different experiences based on their background and contexts. Hence, it is important to hear from them and listen to them. They must engage young people both online and offline, both the elite group of young people, as well as those in rural communities, especially those that lack access to internet and Information. In essence, they must ensure that their youth voices in all their diversity are heard in decision making and programming. One of the ways through which donors can achieve this is to work with local youth NGOs and CSOs on the ground. Because of the connection and the level of trust that these local groups have with does at the grassroots level, they can serve as intermediaries and help to facilitate connection between the donors and other young people.
Furthermore, donors should be open minded and avoid assumption. At times, donors come into communities with preconceived assumptions on the causes of conflicts in such community and their own ideas on what the solution to that conflict/problem should be. For successful and sustainable project implementation, donors should listen more than they speak so that their interventions does not just help in reinforcing existing problems. We have also seen several cases where governments and donors involve young people at the early stages of their interventions to tick boxes on inclusiveness but rarely do they engage them as the project continues, denying them the opportunity to make vital inputs. Young people should be given ownership of the entire project cycle from policy formulation, design, planning, implementation, monitoring, evaluation, and review. Some of our success cases when it comes to youth consultation and project implementation have come from organisations that actually give ownership to young people in the entirety of the program cycle.
Conclusion
Meaningful and inclusive youth engagement in decision-making processes is crucial to sustainability and success of peacebuilding and development efforts. Donors and organisations need to shift from the tokenistic approach to meaningfully engaging youths because young people have a voice and should be allowed to use it. Their voices must also be heard loud and clear because it is not enough for adults to pursue sustainable peace and development for them but rather it must be done with them. Finally, donors, government, and organisations alike should provide spaces that are physically inclusive for young people to advocate for themselves as well as to share their ideas, experiences, and opinions on issues that concern them.
References
Hornby, A.S. (2010). Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English. Oxford: Oxford University Press.