Cut-and-paste youth policies

The analogy may seem hyperbolic, but what we can glean from it is that beneficiaries should be considered prior to making concerted efforts to ameliorate their lives. This conclusion is logical for anyone wishing to be productive.

Why, then, do we make a habit of implementing youth policy, without any true consideration of their prospective beneficiaries? Sport and the arts have been the go-to solutions for organisations claiming to focus on youth development.

These sport and art policies, however, appear to focus on occupying youth’s time and not actually empowering them.

While idle hands are susceptible to mischief and I certainly cannot deny the benefits that sport and the arts can bring to society, is it really okay to do the societal equivalent of placing youth at the kiddie table with crayons and a colouring book? That would be both pretentious and patronising.

Statistics show that Afro-Trinidadian men who are younger than 30 years and in vulnerable communities are the primary perpetrators of crime. It is ironic that this same group of people, in several vulnerable communities nationwide, is often listed as those benefitting from the many implemented sport and arts programmes.

All this would be okay if it was not accompanied by increasing criminality. Is it not lunacy to repeat an action continually and expect different results? While I acknowledge that promising steps have been taken to diversify youth policy, my cynicism leads me to think that, as is typical here in TT, we are moving too slow.

Youth input ensures the success of any society, because the youth are the future leaders, workers and innovators. Innovation, however, requires a constant influx of new problems that require solutions. It is very difficult to be an intelligent young woman in this country, because questions are not respected.

Our unique society requires unique policies, which require research. We do not do enough research and so our scope is limited to making sweeping generalisations about youth and copying policies that work in the unique contexts of other, more developed countries.

In 2009, TT was ranked 51st out of 110 countries on the Boston Consulting Group’s Most Innovative Small Countries List. It is not likely that TT will be known globally for any kind of innovation anytime soon. When juxtaposed with the fact that the majority of our population is younger than 55 years, this is startling.

Age does not always bring reason, because if it did TT would be far ahead of its current place in global innovation. Like our failing economy, which is a symptom of improper planning, a lack of resourcefulness and the delusion that oil booms last forever, our youth policies are unrealistic. Instead of remaining oblivious to important statistics, we really ought to rise to the challenge of conducting proper research. Conclusions can be found when statistics are available and we can either treat our social ills or prevent them from pervading as they currently do. Our own developmental needs matter.

In conclusion, I reiterate that no two humans or nations are the same. National youth policy should never be a copy-and-paste version of anything implemented elsewhere.

We are ro b bing the nation of precious time that could be spent r e a p i n g the fruit of sensible efforts.