During my time with the UNICEF MENA Regional Office this summer, made possible thanks to the generous support of the UNA NY Summer Scholars Program, I had the chance to be a part of and learn from the Adolescent Development and Participation (ADAP) section team. The ADAP section focuses on projects for the engagement and positive development of adolescents and young people in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).
In the world, 408 million youth aged 15-24 or 23% of the global youth presentation are affected by violence or armed conflict, 175 million children will be affected by natural hazards attributed to climate change and 68.5 million people have been forced from home, among them nearly 25.4 million refugees, over half of whom are under the age of 18. In the MENA, 26% of the population in MENA is youth. The youth population will double by 2050, growing from 338 million people in 2000 to 724 million people in 2050. One in five people is an adolescent; yet, adolescents and youth continue to be economically, socially and politically marginalized by unfriendly policies and practices. The region holds the highest youth unemployment rate in the world combined with the lowest labor force participation rate. 225 million (20%) youth in the developing world are not in employment, education or training (NEET) against 34% in the MENA. Even in non-emergency settings, youth are up to four times more likely to be unemployed than adults over 25 years. Political instability, conflict and climate change have further increased the vulnerabilities of young people, exposing them to violence, exploitation and abuse. Despite some improvement, the MENA region remains the least peaceful in the world for the fifth year in a row according to the Global Peace Index 2019. MENA also is the world’s most water scarce region. While hosting 6% of the world’s population, it only has access to 2% of the world’s renewable fresh water. (World Resources Institute, 2015. World Resources Report: Creating a Sustainable Food Future). It has now become urgent to implement solid and scaled action for adolescents and youth with regards to health, education, protection as well as civic and economic participation policies. Such action comes at a critical time as an unprecedently large proportion of the population in the MENA will transition into their most productive years, opening-up the potential for a more prosperous and stable future in which young people can reap the benefits of this demographic dividend. According to the UNICEF MENA Generation 2030 report[1], about 25 million children, adolescents and youth were added by 2015 and a further 34 million will be added by 2030. This relatively slow growth presents a historic opportunity to invest in human capital by improving access to health and education and enhancing the prospects for productive employment. Countries in the region should pursue this opportunity both for the intrinsic value in fulfilling the rights of children, adolescents and youth and as an investment in future economic growth and stability. According to the same report, for the first time in the region, the proportion of the dependent population will be half the proportion of people of working age. The main advantage of such a dividend for the prospects of MENA's children and youth is increased shared wealth and the resulting fiscal space that can be used to further the realization of their rights. Though a favorable age structure is essential, additional pre-requisites for reaping the demographic include: political and social stability; inclusive and equitable economic and social policies (ensuring labor market entrants are healthy, well-nourished and well-equipped in terms of skill and competencies) and expanded employment opportunities. The idea of participation as a constitutive right is reinforced and informed by related rights guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights conventions. The expression of the right to participation is present in the Convention of the Rights of the Child, n.66, art 12.1, which assures to every child, the right to freely express his or her views “in all matters affecting the child”, and requires that the child’s views be given “due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child”.[2] Fundamentally, participation rights are also derived from the principle of inherent human dignity, which entails “an entitlement to partake in decisions that affect one’s life and contribute to the realization of one’s own rights, rather than depending solely on others for the fulfilment of one's rights”. Despite these binding international obligations, few governments or organizations have made the required commitments related to financial, legal, social and policy frameworks to support young people’s right to participation. Structural obstacles such as discrimination, marginalization and social exclusion restrict their access to productive activities and decision-making processes, while socio-cultural norms create further barriers that refrain young people from enjoying their full rights. Recognizing the right to participation for young people implies accepting that they have real possibilities for exercising their citizenship as a basic requirement of their development and for influencing their environment and society. The objective of adolescent and youth engagement is to give voice and choice for young people to work with government and non-governmental organization to develop positive environments. Evidence[3] show that successful adolescent and youth engagement programmes can help develop self-confidence, influence decisions at local and national levels, and contribute to addressing socio-economic challenges in their communities. When young people are supported and encouraged with policies attentive to their needs and capabilities, they have the potential to break long-standing cycles of inequality, poverty, discrimination and violence. As they gain more of these skills, youth begin to think of themselves as stakeholders in society, acquire a sense of responsibility for the common good and internalize a positive attitude toward active citizenship.[4] Investing in adolescents today means shaping tomorrow’s adults for decision-making, for leadership and for acting; in a nutshell, shaping what tomorrow looks like, especially in countries where their roles are too often dismissed.
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One of the tasks I worked on during those three months with the UNICEF regional office is building a case for the engagement of young people in budget-making initiatives in Jordan. Participatory budgeting (PB) is a tool for participatory democracy, which was at first implemented in Brazil in the late 1980s and has since spread to over 3,000 communities large and small throughout the world. The idea for PB began when scholars John Lerner, Michael Menser, and Giampaolo Baiocchi met at the 2005 World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil in 2005, the place where it was first launched in 1989. PB is defined by the World Bank as “an approach to budgeting offering citizens at large an opportunity to learn about government operations and to deliberate, debate, and influence the allocation of public resources as a tool for educating, engaging, and empowering citizens and strengthening demand for good governance”. PB allows citizens to identify, discuss, and prioritize public spending projects, and gives them the power to make real decisions about how money is spent.
Participatory budgeting processes are typically designed to involve those left out of traditional methods of public engagement, such as low-income residents, non-citizens, and youth. However, cases of youth in participatory budgeting outside Latin America are very limited. It is particularly hard to implement in regions like MENA where the divide between leaders and youth keeps deepening every day; where initiatives for participation to public debate are extremely rare; and where youth are routinely dismissed. In collaboration with the UNICEF Country Office working on a fiscal space analysis to increase spending on adolescents and youth in Jordan within the limitations of existing budgets, we worked on building a case to help the Jordanian government envision how PB with adolescents and youth could work in Jordan. While documenting such initiatives from around the world, it was clear to me that there were many benefits to get from such policies on several levels. In addition to creating a more positive social environment, there is for example strong evidence of tax delinquency reduction. In Porto Alegre, where it all started, the city increased its tax revenues by 48%. The city of Recife, in Brazil as well, also implemented participatory budgeting, with a strong focus on children through the engagement of school teachers and principals. Another case from Congo focuses on the use of new technologies and mobile to engage with as many citizens in the process as possible. A rich publication from UNICEF on influencing domestic finance for children can be found here for more information on processes and tools. UNICEF identified four key action areas to implement such initiatives:
On our end, this deliverable is to be shared with the UNICEF Country Office and the Jordanian Ministry of Youth in September alongside the public space analysis being currently conducted. On my end though, it is to be shared in the two weeks, before I depart, but I hope to hear back about the possibility to implement this later in the year. |
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