December 2, 2019
What is Youth Advocacy?
Youth advocacy is lighting a fire across the world today, with more and more youths finding they not only have a voice, but platforms to advocate for causes they believe in and network with like-minded individuals.
The world around us is ever changing; new challenges are surfacing, and old challenges have re-emerged. Some of these recent challenges include new technologies, privacy in the digital world and child protection. Alongside these newer challenges are some long-term issues we as a species are still trying to tackle. Some notable examples include climate change, gender-based violence and children’s rights. The first step for any positive change is to understand and acknowledge that there is an issue that can be resolved or improved. In order to raise awareness of this, the use of advocacy is imperative.
But what exactly is advocacy and why is it important for youths to be advocates?
The Oxford Dictionary defines Advocacy as “The giving of public support to an idea, a course of action or a belief.” This can be in the form of discussion, publications or activities surrounding the areas of social systems, politics, economics, science and more. The aim of advocacy is to influence decision-making in these areas and to inform the public or governmental bodies about said issues. Advocacy allows people to defend and safeguard rights by raising awareness.
Though the opinion on what ages constitutes as youth varies in different contexts, the United Nations defines youth as someone between the ages of 15 and 24. The definition of youth varies from different cultures and countries with as old as 40 being viewed as youthful in the Middle East. As of January 2019, the global population of youths aged 13-24 equated to 19% of the human population. So with just under 20% of the population falling into this age range, just how valuable are their experiences and opinions to the greater world?
Let’s look at some statistics on youth
- Nearly half of the world’s young live in Sub-Saharan Africa
- 6% of the global youth uses the internet
- 9 out of the 10 youths not connected to the internet live in Africa, Asia or the Pacific
- As of 2018, 42% of the world’s population are 25 years and under
So why is youth advocacy its own initiative instead of simply ‘advocacy’? There are issues surrounding youth that cannot be ignored and are youth-specific. For example, rights to education, school shootings, child marriage, sexual exploitation, neglect, exposure to war and more. Challenges youths face only increase and diversify when looked at on a geographical level. The obstacles a 20 year old male from California would face are worlds apart from the experiences and challenges of a 13 year old girl in South Sudan. It is for this reason that it’s essential for advocacy to come from the youths themselves, thereby providing a level of authenticity due to the first-hand experiences and fresh perspective.
While most human beings are able to sympathise to some degree with the experiences of others, not many are able to fully comprehend or empathise. According to a study published in the journal Brain and Behavior, “sensory processing sensitivity (SPS), found in roughly 20% of humans… is a trait associated with greater sensitivity and responsiveness to the environment and to social stimuli.” Advocacy is powerful because it has the ability to bridge the gap between the ‘affected’ and the ‘spectators’ by providing real human voices and faces to a cause, which enables it to become that much more real to the rest of society.
It’s important to note that youth advocacy does not simply encompass youth-related topics but also general issues at large. A recent example of this would be the large youth turnout at the Global Climate Change Strikes that took place in September 2019.
During recent years within the UK alone, more and more youths are engaging in processes to bring about social change. A piece by The Guardian on the 2019 general election was headlined “Surge in young people registering to vote”, highlighting how a third of voters registering within a two-day period were aged 25 and under. This, coupled with the passionate demonstrations of youths against climate change, as demonstrated in the video above, provides a small insight towards the drive and engagement of today’s youth in tackling and hopefully solving some of the world’s issues.
These are just a handful of some of the recent activities within youth advocacy and it is increasing every day. The UN has dedicated resources to the UN Youth Strategy in addition to UNICEF’s dedicated youth ambassadors and advocates. The world at large is slowly but surely paying more attention to youth advocacy and more and more youths are participating.
