Youth Rising: How Children and Youth are Transforming the United Nations and Driving a Global Paradigm Shift in the Structure of Human Societies
Youth Rising: How Children and Youth are Transforming the United Nations and Driving a Global Paradigm Shift in the Structure of Human Societies
By Denny Taylor
The July 2020 U.N. High Level Political Forum (HLPF) was an historic moment unparalleled since humans began documenting our cultural and biological evolution, for at this global forum everyone agreed to hand over the future to their children.[i]
Predictably the media missed it. The global pandemic, which is a social and economic crisis as well as a public health emergency, is taking all the oxygen on the planet.
“We have been brought to our knees – by a microscopic virus,” António Guterres, the Secretary-General of the U.N. said about COVID.[ii] “The pandemic has demonstrated the fragility of our world. It has laid bare risks we have ignored for decades: inadequate health systems; gaps in social protection; structural inequalities; environmental degradation; the climate crisis.”
“Entire regions that were making progress on eradicating poverty and narrowing inequality have been set back years. One hundred million more people could be pushed into extreme poverty. We could see famines of historic proportions. We face the deepest global recession since World War II, and the broadest collapse in incomes since 1870.”
So it is understandable that, even though it was one of the first major worldwide intergovernmental meetings with universal participation and broad stakeholder engagement since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, the media missed all their cues and did not report on the U.N. HLPF and the extraordinary events that took place in the forum’s virtual world.
One hundred and thirty seven Heads and Deputy Heads of State and Government ministerial level officials attended the 2020 HLPF, and 47 countries presented their nation’s progress (or lack of it) on achieving the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). And, it was at this HLPF on "accelerated action and transformative pathways” to save the planet that the world order changed forever.
“Accelerated action and transformative pathways” was a great title for the 2020 HLPF, and excessively ambitious at first glance, given that at the previous 2019 HLPF expressions of concern about the lack of progress on the SDGs were commonplace, and there was general agreement with one presenter from a NGO who stated that participating in the HLPF on the lack of progress on the SDGs was like moving backwards on a treadmill.
“There are a large number of governments that don’t care one way or other about human rights,” a senior U.N. Official stated at one 2019 HLPF session. “If the U.N. pushes back against human rights violations it is accused of undermining governments,” he stated. “Many countries do not want ‘human rights’ mentioned in any discussions or included in any U.N. documents. If we mention human rights in our strategic plans we get push back.”
“What’s happened to Human Rights up Front?” a man in the audience asked.[iii]
“Human Rights up Front is in difficulties,” the U.N. Official stated. “It’s been systematically broken apart.” The official looked tired and dispirited as he noted that human rights receives only three and a half percent of the U.N. budget, which is troubling given that it is one of the three pillars of the U.N. “We’re off track,” the U.N. Official stated. “The huge SDG architecture has not delivered.”
At the 2019 HLPF the acute sense of urgency at sessions organized by Major Groups and other Stakeholders (MGoS) was palpable. Representatives of multilateral organizations, civil society, academia, activists, advocates, faith leaders, and participants from voluntary networks all expressed their concerns at the lack of progress. They shared an unsettling energy to “push forward” and to “call for action” on the SDGs. They were united by a common purpose – to insist that U.N. Member States be “more accountable,” “more inclusive” and to “leave no one behind.” In contrast, as another U.N. Official stated at the sessions with representatives of U.N. Member States, the overriding message was to “push back”.
“Moral and ethical boundaries have been violated,” another presenter stated, “and civil society can no longer function in silence.”
The U.N. Official spoke at length about the push back against the U.N. human rights agenda by U.N. Member States, and sounding tired, he told the audience that many U.N. Member States deny the connection between the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and human rights. He made the case that many countries had taken a similar stance, lauding the advancement of SDGs in their own country, while ignoring their unacceptable behavior and degradation of their own people.
At the 2019 HLPF there was also concern, expressed by many representatives of the MGoS, that the Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs), presented by U.N. Member States were more like “travelogues” than reports on the SDGs. “One presenter of a VNR talked about their country as a ‘destination’,” an MGoS participant stated at one of the side-events organized by an NGO with General Consultative Status. “The VNRs are written to attract tourists!”
Fast-forward to the 2020 HLPF and there were new positive indicators of the rapid transformations that are taking place both at the U.N. and in member states. “The U.N. today is not the U.N. of 2015,” a high-up official at the 2020 HLPF said at a meeting that took place during the forum.[iv] He added, “or 2012,” referring to the Rio +20 U.N. Conference on Sustainable Development, and paragraph 84 of The Future we Want – the outcome document of Rio+20 that recommended the establishment of the HLPF. The U.N. official smiled, perhaps because the next statement he was going to make could not have been anticipated a year ago. “There is now at the U.N. level total agreement on youth mobilization on the SDGs.” Again he paused, “And climate change. In the real world, they are one.”
With the Sendai Agreement[v], the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals all off track, and with COVID-19 intensifying the systemic complexity of global risks confronting humanity, at the 2020 HLPF young people were invited to reverse the catastrophic downward spiral. Their elders embraced youth, and there appeared to be universal stakeholder recognition that youth are uniquely positioned to address the inertia of U.N. member states on addressing the SDGs, and that by so doing young people are creating the conditions for great transformations to take place at the U.N.
“We cannot wait for governments to act,” one MGoS participant from Brazil stated on July 15. “We have got to listen to children and place them at the center of all decision making. Neither governments nor civil society can do it on their own.”
“We have the opportunity to transform all societies,” another MGoS participant said on July 16, “especially for children. We need to raise the voices of children. We need a care-based recovery. Children need a sustainable way to live their lives. The health of the planet is linked to the health of young people. We need a transformative new paradigm, ethical leadership, good government to reduce inequality and injustice. The world is not only at a tipping point. It is also at breaking point. We must restructure. In unprecedented times of global crisis we must listen to youth.”
And so at the 2020 HLPF, children and youth stepped up and received the blessing of their elders, who bequeathed to young people the onerous task of saving the planet, because of the excesses of adults and their willful destruction of Earth’s vulnerable ecosystems, and their refusal to alter course.
“You fix it,” was the implicit message to youth at the 2020 HLPF as governments failed to act. “Biodiversity loss, deforestation, water stress, as well as global pollution from chemicals and waste, we are leaving them all to you.”
There are 1.8 billion people on the planet between the ages of 10 – 24 and by 2030 their numbers will be close to 2 billion. Already, they are the largest generation of youth in history, and while nations often see them as a burden, Secretary-General António Guterres is repositioning them, shining a light on their capacity to think outside the box, and giving them an opportunity to reshape the future in ways that the generations that have gone before them have proved themselves incapable of doing.
“The United Nations stands with you and belongs to you,” Guterres has said, with “uncertainty and insecurity all around” you are our “greatest source of hope”. [vi]
Guterres has spoken on multiple occasions of paying tribute to the power of youth around the planet. “From climate action to gender equality to social justice and human rights, your generation is on the frontlines and in the headlines”, he has said. “I am inspired by your passion and determination”.
Noting that young people are “rightly demanding a role in shaping the future”, he often repeats, “I am with you. The United Nations stands with you – and belongs to you.”
To achieve the SDGs, children and youth are contesting the global violation of human rights and resisting the oppression, prejudice and suffering of vulnerable people.[vii] In the power shift to achieve the 2030 SDGs, young people are prioritizing the elimination of poverty and contesting racial and gender discrimination and oppression. Young people are challenging all hierarchies based on wealth, work and descent, and are constructing a macrostrategy for human survival.
At the 2020 U.N. HLPF their message was loud and strong. Children and youth are doing what the “grown-ups” in human societies have refused to do. “Many say the world won’t be the same after the COVID-19 pandemic,” a young woman says in a YouTube video for #FreeTheFuture. “It won’t be. It might be worse. We can’t return to a normal that despoils nature and condemns billions to poverty and bodily exhaustion. We cannot allow the continued destruction of the Amazon bringing us closer to a tipping point. We must use the suspension of economic activities to return to imagining a future where we can and want to live. We want to end all inequalities, social, racial, gender and even species too. We want to free the future.”[viii]
“We need a complete paradigm shift and a transformation linking climate change, biodiversity and land degradation together,” Yasmine Fouad, a youth participant from Egypt, explains at the 2020 HLPF. “That is the heart of the sustainable development goals.” [ix]
“Young people see the start of the Decade of Action as an opportunity to stop, to rethink, to dismantle systems of oppression, realign our values and enact meaningful structural reforms, which will put in place the proper mechanisms to galvanize the U.N. Member states, private sector and civil society,” explains Jayathma Wickramanayake, the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Envoy on Youth. “Many young people feel the needs and rights of marginalized groups should be better represented given their unique vulnerabilities.”[x]
“Dear Friends, Warm Greetings of Peace and Solidarity,” begins an email on a U.N. listserv from Youth For Environment Education And Development (YFEED) in the follow-up to the 2020 HLPF.
“We are pleased to formally announce our new International Webinar entitled ‘Super Youth Dialogue on South-South Youth Cooperation for Global Action,' organized to commemorate the International Day of Friendship 2020.”
“This webinar primarily targets young peoples, although all are welcome to attend,” the representative of YFEED writes. “Stay safe and sound. We shall overcome soon. Cheers! Yours Respectfully.
I registered in solidarity with young people.
“There is so much we can do if we unite for global action,” the young organizer from Nigeria said, when he introduced the panel - a Youth Representative from Morocco for the High Atlas Foundation, a Youth Climate Activist from Brazil, a Youth Ambassador from Kenya for Maasai Women for Education and Economic Development (MAWEED), and the Youth Co-founder from Brazil of the #FreeTheFuture Movement who has been invited by the Secretary General of the U.N., António Guterres, to participate as a youth envoy in the U.N. youth leadership movement to address climate change.[xi]
“What motivated me was the young people on the front lines,” The young activist from Brazil said, at the beginning of the South on South Super Youth webinar. “If there is something that will get us through it is what you guys bring to the table. So that’s why I connect with young people. What makes us safe in this world is what we give to each other.”
The youth ambassador for Kenya, who is working with Maasai women, participated on his cell phone – “From the perspective of the SDGs indigenous people are affected by all of them. We are fighting to get water and we have to motivate each other.”
“We have to become part of the solution right?” the Brazilian activist said, “the rich and powerful have made it impossible for us to live on Earth. There are thousands of groups we can join and make a difference together. The future we want is possible. We have to get together and make it happen.
“It’s all about the follow-up from youth,” the youth leader from Morocco said. “The ideas for the future should come from youth. Youth add an entirely new dimension, breaking down the hierarchies, unifying nations, local communities working together, figuring out their problems.”
“Before I am Nigerian, I am human,” the youth leader from Nigeria says, “that’s an important point. First we are human.”
“When we wake up the first thing we think is ‘what are we going to eat?’ and so many people are hungry around the world,” the Brazilian youth leader said. She talked about her indigenous friends who are in the Amazon and who have shut out the outside world because of the pandemic. “They are more and more inside their own futures.”
The youth participant from Morocco spoke of trust in the future, the danger of making the same mistakes, and the need for participatory decisions.
“We are a lot,” the Brazilian youth said, “so we have to be heard by the people in power.”
“When bad people take power they threaten our lives,” the youth leader working with Maasai women said, “they gut social investment.”
“We may be young, but there is so much we can do together,” the youth leader from Nigeria said. “There is a path and an opportunity. It is true youth are the future, but they are also the present. We need to bring about change at a global level.”
At the 2020 HLPF young people called for global action and all government and civil society sectors were united in their support of them.
“We are in a profound moment of transformation,” was the resounding soundbite that reverberated through the Zoom meetings of U.N. agencies, faith leaders, and voluntary networks.
“The world is not only at a tipping point, but also at a breaking point,” scientists and academics warned.
“Neither governments nor civil society can do it on their own,” civil society, activists and advocates stated.
Our lives depend on our collective responsibility,” representatives of multilateral organizations stated.
“The survival of our children depends on the actions we take now,” many said.
“We need coalitions of youth leaders and policy makers.”
“We need to restore trust between governments and young people.”
“Our single responsibility is to work alongside youth to create ethical leadership and good governance,” a presenter stated.
At meeting after meeting participants spoke of “reducing inequality and injustice, and building resilience.”
“Sharing, exchanging and building,” they shared in the chat.
“Thank God for the energy and leadership of our youth,” a faith leader said.
“Young people are leading the way.”
“We have a great opportunity to transform societies,” was the resounding message from every sector, “and raise the voices of children and young people to change the ways we live in the world.”
The tectonic plates of human societies are shifting, but in the U.S. neither the government nor the media are paying attention.
Energy is being released that has historically been repressed. Young people are rising and the U.N. is supporting their call for global action. Across all sectors there is a conscious commitment to include the participation of youth in addressing global challenges, transforming boundaries, and embracing equity in global solutions.
Let’s hope that it isn’t too late.
[i] This paper is based: 1) on a three year ethnographic study of the United Nations High Level Political Forums (2018-2020); 2) participation on listservs established by U.N. Major Groups and other Stakeholders (MGoS); 3) participation in meetings and webinars of MGoS and scientific organizations); and 4) a deep analysis of documents produced by the U.N. and by MGoS. The paper is also informed by 40 years of ethnographic research and transdisciplinary studies combining perspectives from the social and physical sciences to explore the systemic complexity of catastrophes and disasters caused by and impacting people and the planet.
[ii] https://www.un.org/en/coronavirus/tackling-inequality-new-social-contract-new-era
[iii] Human Rights up Front (HRuF) is the Secretary-General's initiative to strengthen prevention of serious problems with human rights consequences that cut across the U.N.'s three pillars of: 1) peace and security; 2) development; and 3) human rights.
[iv] https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=21&v=Eg0-CaDcYgs&feature=emb_logo
[v] The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 (“the Sendai Framework”) was one of three landmark agreements adopted by the U.N. in 2015, the other two being the Sustainable Development Goals Agenda 2030, and the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. The 2019 UNDRR/ISC Sendai Hazard Definition and Classification Review Technical Report supports all three by providing a common set of hazard definitions for monitoring and reviewing implementation which calls for “a data revolution, rigorous accountability mechanisms and renewed global partnerships.”
[vi] https://www.indepthnews.net/index.php/global-governance/un-insider/3214-un-chief-regards-youth-as-the-greatest-source-of-hope
[vii] https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/youth/
[viii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vs4gwdQO56E
[ix] https://www.globalpolicywatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20200724-UN-Monitor-18-Heard-at-HLPF.pdf
[x] https://www.globalpolicywatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20200724-UN-Monitor-18-Heard-at-HLPF.pdf
[xi] https://www.un.org/youthenvoy/2013/09/envoy-on-youth-highlights-key-role-of-youth-in-addressing-climate-change/