A department created by Clinton, it reviews youth policies and empowers young people through US programs which attempt to engage youth and their governments.[break]
After interacting with young Nepalis, law students in Tribuuwan University, and even Youth Minister Kamala Rokka, Republica sat down with Ronan to discuss youth issues across the world and in Nepal.
Having interacted with youth and people linked to youth issues, what is your take on the youth issues here?
What you see here, at least in my interaction with more urban youth in Kathmandu is, young people with tremendous tools at their disposal. I spoke to the law college here and to a lot of vibrant, energetic, creative young people for whom there is a lot of anxiety about whether they can make their voices heard in this critical process to writer Nepal’s new Constitution.
I think it’s heartening when I compare the youth here to the youth at other places I’ve worked, many young Nepalis are extraordinarily linked into global and international events and have a lot of tools, I think, to construct solutions for their country.
Not everyone is politically active or interested so what is their responsibility - how can they contribute?
I think there are different ways to make one’s voice heard, I think that young people in rural parts of this country who aren’t as politically involved can still make their voices heard. I think just in your own community, living out the kind of life you want to live freely and feeling entitled to assemble when you have an opinion to voice is important.
And when I talk about the economic portion of this global agenda – that’s not limited to flashy young entrepreneurs but also young workers in every walk of life because young people who are less connected to the international community are still struggling from the same shared challenges of needing a job, needing a way to support those families – we have no simple answers to those challenges but for both rural and urban youth we want to stand by them and create opportunities.
As part of Global Youth Issues you’re in Nepal for the first time, what’s your plan?
It’s really taking young voices and giving young people a seat at the table in ways that we haven’t historically. The United States has always had a commitment to youth engagement and we’ve had programs in our embassies all around the world from democracy training to governance training to programs that mentor young people and provide language skills, but we never had a cohesive strategy or policy that said this is a cornerstone of our foreign policy.
This is a big challenge we face as youth are one of the big groups around the world that we want to stand by as part of our core set of values. So that exactly is the project we’re engaged in now.
It’s been a privilege for me to be a part of the project of pulling a task force from the US government on how we can change the game on talking to and, more importantly, on listening to young people.
The task force is committed to creating jobs for young people and linking them to economic opportunities and on increasing opportunities for political participation, so they can make their voices heard. Part of that was framed by my person experience – the theme I’d hear over and over again was, “I have no access to a livelihood, I have no job and I have no way of making my voice hear in my community politically.”
So, I think America’s commitment to these pillars of activities could be transformative if we really focus in on those goals and join forces with people all around the globe to address them. And my office, the office of Global Youth Issues is designed to focus on those goals and to bring more young voices into the policy process as we address them.
So besides employment and education are there other major issues you’ve seen which need to be addressed on a global scale?
Well, it’s interesting because the challenges are unique to each country. Nepal is a great example of those universal challenges because you have by some count 75% of people under the age of 35 and significant unemployment for that demographic, and you obviously have this moment where young people need to be connected for the constitutional process for the future of the country.
I talked to a lot of young Nepalis who expressed frustration at the current government apparatus and understandably so, but what was inspiring was to hear from them that they also understand that they need to give some time for those new institutions to drop roots and to participate peacefully and to try to actually see those institutions succeed. So I would say that is a common theme I’ve seen across the countries – young people trying to make that transition from fiery revolutionaries to being parts of new stable prosperous governments.
One of your agendas is linking youth to their local governments but on an international scale there isn’t an arena for youth to be politically involved, should that and can it change?
Absolutely, the United States puts a lot of emphasis on linkages programs of exactly that type that partner young people around the world to American youth and that bring young people from around the world to America to either go to school or train. We have programs that focus on global challenges and we have numerous exchange programs in Nepal but there’s one that is coming up this summer that will bring Nepali youth specifically to American to train them in civic engagement and participation.
More than that, I think, we need to see young people’s voices represented not only on national and regional governance processes but in the international community itself and it’ll be interesting to watch what the United Nations does. I just came from Oslo, Norway, where there was a summit focused on how to better incorporate youth voices in the United Nations, so I think there’s a lot of attention to how we can create new structures to bring in young voices and listen closely to them and say, “We’re standing by you, we’re not imposing our agenda but we’re trying to listen closely to yours.”
On a global scale, but specifically in Nepal, youth blame the government, but what can youth do to be actively part of the solution?
I do think that pressure is a good thing and young people in Nepal can step forward and peacefully demand the youth policy that’s currently being tabled in parliament, to demand the youth action committee that is supposedly going to result from that policy, and to demand the correct amount of focus on the right to assemble and be heard and on their opportunities to participate in markets and to gain jobs as this new stable peaceful Nepal attracts more foreign investment and more opportunity.
It would be arrogant of me to say that anyone is wrong to purpose the opportunities they have in front of them but I will say that I tremendously admire the young Nepali entrepreneurs and political leaders that have stuck around to build solutions right here because I know what a challenge it is to stay when the country is in a period of transition when easier opportunities are available elsewhere. But I think it’s a testament to the strength of Nepali youth that so many have stayed and are building solutions here. Nepal has a tremendous resource in those people who choose to stay.
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