By Doug Ragan
U.N.-Habitat, has found that investing in
youth resilience is critical to the positive development of
youth and their communities. Resilience is defined as the
ability for young people to cope, adapt to and effect change.
If youth are resilient it allows them to overcome difficulties
in their lives, something that is critical for youth living in the
developing world who are often faced with poverty, limited
employment and lack of access to services.
“People say you will be leaders of tomorrow, but you are
already leaders of today. I do not want to leave the world in
this shape for you; I wish for a better world, better for all, ”
said U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon at the Children
and Youth conference. A key focus of this conference is
increasing the resiliency of youth and their communities.
U.N.-Habitat’s Urban Youth Fund, which funds youth-led
groups in the developing world, supports youth and
community resilience. We have funded 177 youth-led groups
from 67 countries in the developing world, in issues ranging
from climate change to the prevention of violence against
women.
One of the groups supported
by the fund is Harassmap, a
project run by young women
based in Cairo, Egypt.
Harassmap seeks to increase
the resilience of young
women and the communities
they live in against
harassment and violence.
They use technology
combined with grassroots
organizing to map and
improve the safety of women
in Cairo. When someone
experiences or witnesses
sexual harassment, they can
submit a report via SMS,
email or social media that
includes the details of the
incident, as well as
address. Harassmap then
verifies the reports and places
them on a Google map of
Egypt. Following this,
Harassmap visits the areas
where incidences have occurred to raise awareness about
sexual harassment and find ways to stop it. By meeting with
local residents, Harassmap is mobilizing them to make their
neighborhoods "harassment-free zones."
Another group that UN-Habitat supported is Sisi Ni Amani
(“We are Peace” in Swahili) used a combination of traditional
and innovative approaches to communication and dialogue
to increase civic engagement and prevent violence in
Kenyan communities. During Kenya’s
elections, communication technologies were used to trigger
and facilitate violence. Mobile phones in particular were
used to spread hate speech and organize attacks.
Sisi Ni Amani used mobile technology as a tool for civic
education, civic engagement and dialogue to help Kenyans
realize their common needs irrespective of political divides.
They provided a neutral source of credible information and
peace promotion.
Key to increasing the resilience of youth is the recognition of
them as leaders, who have a right to be engaged in the
decisions that affect them. Youth are society’s most essential
and dynamic human resource. There are more people
under the age of 25 today than ever, totaling nearly 3 billion;
1.8 billion of those are between the age of 12 and 24. It is to
the detriment of the youth, and society as a whole, to not
fully engage them, the large majority of whom live in the
developing world.
Youth 21 is an initiative sponsored by youth civil society and
national governments that develops mechanisms to better
engage young people in governance. In fall of 2011, UN-
Habitat published Youth 21: Building an Architecture for
Youth Engagement in the U.N. System, which outlined a
number of ways the U.N. system could be made more youth
friendly. One proposal was the creation of a special adviser
on youth. In the spring of 2012, the U.N. secretary-general
announced the creation of the envoy on youth, the highest
level youth position ever created within the U.N. system.
Next on the agenda for Youth 21 is working towards creating
a permanent mechanism within the UN system to advocate
for and represent youth and their issues. The Asker
Declaration, adopted at the Asker Conference on Youth and
Governance, held in Oslo, Norway, in December 2014,
mapped a way forward for the global community to develop
this platform.
Youth have for too long been the lost demographic, with no
or little attention given to their current and latent leadership
potential. Building youth resilience and capacity is both a
right and an imperative. As we move towards the adoption
of the post-2015 development goals, let us partner with
young people to bring about a sustainable future for the
youth of today and tomorrow.
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About the Author
Douglas Ragan has worked in youth development with NGOs, local and national governments and the United
Nations at the local, national and international level for the past 25 years. Currently he is the Chief of Youth and
Livelihoods Unit for UN-Habitat, managing UN-Habitat's Global portfolio on youth development in over 70 developing countries. The programmes focus on urban youth development, including youth employment, governance and participation. He manages three flagship youth programmes for UN-Habitat: the Urban Youth Fund, the Youth 21 initiative and the One Stop Youth Resource
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