Our Global Education System, as structured, teaches us that youths are the future of tomorrow’s world, and they possess the ability to redefine and change the socioeconomic and geopolitical dynamics of the modern world.
It also teaches us that young people possess the necessary creativity, talent, energy and drive, vision and outlook, as well as technological and transformational skills needed to confront some of the world’s most serious threats to the coexistence and continuity of the human race, and protection as well as preservation of the environment in which they cohabit.
As a result, elders across the globe and in very different locales have wasted no time in underscoring the importance of education, integrity, truth, knowledge and reason as prerequisites that should be instilled in youths in their most formative years.
This has led to the creation and continued development of formal and informal institutions and organisations over several decades, if not centuries, aimed at preparing young people for the mantle of leadership while nurturing them to shape and redefine the global order in a positive and more effective manner.
Additionally, there can be no argument made against the fact that the rhetoric and philosophy of many powerful and ordinary elders are supportive of young people adding their voices and joining on global discourses on crime and violence, ending wars and diseases, reducing poverty and inequality, ending human rights’ injustices and social discrimination, and maintaining the balance of power and the search for world peace.
Youths the world over — distractions aside — after working, studying and adhering to the social constructs of their time, are expectant that as soon as they feel they are of age, they can lead, rule the world, engineer positive and revolutionary changes, and take up their destinies.
Unfortunately, recent history is replete with examples of how the very system and elders that encouraged and educated youths are actively undermining their efforts to lead and create change as they see it.
The truth is, many elders refuse to step aside and allow new, youthful blood to take over the spheres of power and control that influence aspects of the world’s status quo.
Many of them use the excuse that youths are unsettled in their worldview, are too ambitious and inexperienced, and are possibly incompetent and problematic. So they use various structural policies to give them ‘some kinda’ power, presence, and a limited voice, with the obvious aim of window-dressing to appear pro-youth and pro-inclusive.
In the developed world, any market analysis would show how hard it is for youths to climb to the top of dominant firms, entities, and leadership groups such as the UN, WTO, PAHO/WHO and a slew of others. They literally have to upset and fight against the discriminatory processes that favour elders over youth to get ahead; and in many cases, they prove themselves worthy of their portfolios, once interference is kept at bay.
Closer to home, there are fewer opportunities for youths to be part of a meaningful regional discourse and decision-making process that changes the way things are done in the Caribbean and South America.
While there are many established paper laws and institutions that seek to place youth into the pot of power, there are even more personalities and elders who prefer conformity to their traditionalistic and idealistic outlook on regional affairs over the daring, bold, and sometimes too-ambitious plans of youths.
Decades after, the Caribbean Community still does not have a cohesive, influential, and powerful youth forum that can hold its elders to account whenever they fail to deliver; or debate with meaningful outcomes, and not paper declarations, important socioeconomic and political issues that are retarding the forward movement of integration and the unification process, as well as the growth of the region.
At home, where power is concentrated in the realm of politics and wealth, the situation is worse, but not surprising. Youths are used as poster boys and girls for political campaigning purposes, marketing appeals by powerful companies, and rubber stamps for aid and donor agencies; but are hardly ever properly rewarded, promoted, empowered, or made influential.
While it is clear the Government is taking steps to deal with aspects of youth leadership and inclusivity by piloting a National Youth Policy, that policy remains in the theatre, undergoing corrective surgery even though it has been completed.
It seems as if youths are given prominence only when elders need them to access wealth, power and status. While there are hundreds of elders who are eager to step aside, and are not guilty of hoarding power and positions, there are thousands more who pay pure lip service to notions of youth power, influence and leadership.
It may be too late for the latter group when they realise that they should have been wiser, as the world they will live in is still to be shaped by the ideas and visions of the young.
