Addressing the challenges of the coming years will require markedly different models of communication and interaction on the international stage and beyond. The Our Common Agenda report of the Secretary-General, for example, calls for fundamental renewal of the social contract, that “understanding within a society of how people solve shared problems, manage risks and pool resources to deliver public goods.” The State bears key institutional responsibility for ensuring arrangements that are just, humane, and effective. Yet the State is not the only actor capable of advancing meaningful social transformation. Young people, too, can—and must—spearhead efforts to develop entirely new patterns of communication and interaction between individuals, communities, and social institutions. 

Young people in every cultural context are embedded in rich networks of family, neighborhood, and community. Such ties are vital to cohesive and harmonious societies, yet civil society organizations and governmental agencies often approach young people in ways that obscure or ignore the social context in which youth function, interacting with them instead as if they were stand-alone, autonomous agents. Opportunities for advancement in programs, for example, often require extensive travel or relocation to far-away localities; expectations of participation and time commitments can come at the expense of young people’s relationships with family members, friends, and other acquaintances. Youth-oriented initiatives therefore have much to learn about communicating and interacting not just with youth themselves, but with the many others who surround them in the broader social context. This can be understood as one response to wider patterns of individualism and disconnection that have grown increasingly common around the world. Youth have much to offer, for example, in developing models of collective volition, united action, and collaborative decision-making. “Leadership is not about the elevation of self,” one young activist noted in a recent forum held at the United Nations. “It’s about the elevation of the community—so that through our action and efforts, more and more people prosper together.” 

Building a better world is the work of all populations and age groups; strengthening patterns of intergenerational partnership will therefore be of vital importance. Many young people today face norms of respect that demand deference and obedience to elders; institutional structures that exclude and marginalize their contributions; and cultural stereotypes that view them as unreliable, inexperienced, or self-absorbed. For their part, many elders face social norms that promote youth culture, habits, and tastes; social institutions that dismiss and discriminate against them; and cultural stereotypes that view them as out of touch, past their prime, and ineffectual. Clearly, entirely new models will need to be developed around how different age cohorts collaborate with one another across the life cycle, including as individuals transition from one stage to the next. In this, youth and young adults are uniquely positioned to collaborate both “upwards” with older colleagues, but also “downwards” with children and adolescents, who look up to and often emulate them. Many activists are also identifying the need for spaces that are highly intergenerational but organized around substantive aims and objectives, rather than designations of age, per se. Such an approach focuses less on bringing those defined as “youth” into contact with those defined as “adults,” than on creating spaces and ongoing processes in which younger and older collaborators are developing experience and knowledge together, working shoulder-to-shoulder and supporting one another over time.

In societies around the world, a growing share of interpersonal engagement is mediated through online channels and platforms. Information and communications technologies (ICT) are therefore central to any consideration of youth and social interaction. Linkages between youth and technology are often overemphasized, as if younger generations’ contributions to a better world could be reduced to writing code or designing apps. Digital technologies hold great promise, of course, but they have already caused considerable harm, as well. Youth are not immune to these dangers simply by having come of age using digital technologies. Indeed, ills such as media addiction, information overload, polarization, radicalization, and shortened attention span can be even more pernicious in a period of life characterized by ongoing neurological development in the brain, as well as psychological development of personal identity and sense of self. But despite these challenges—perhaps even because of them—youth have immense potential to lead the way toward societies engaging digital communications more thoughtfully and using them more constructively. Young people can provide vital insight, for example, into how various technologies can augment and expand meaningful in-person relationships, instead of replacing them. They can explore how emerging technologies can be deployed to advance social goals, instead of society continually adapting itself to the imperatives of each new wave of technological products. Critical in this regard will be individuals, communities, and entire societies learning how to make purposeful, values-informed choices about how technologies will be embraced and employed. Recent developments in artificial intelligence, which have accelerated even further the already rapid pace of technological change, have made it clear that critical values must be consciously embraced and promoted—qualities such as truthfulness, honesty, integrity, and trustworthiness—if communications technologies are to be a source of social benefit and not breakdown. 

Young people communicate and interact through formal structures and institutional mechanisms, many of which are no longer fit for purpose and will need to be reimagined. Equally serious are challenges at the level of daily, person-to-person interaction. Societies around the world are facing growing levels of social anxiety, disconnection, loneliness, and isolation, particularly among younger generations. Many feel less capable of forming meaningful friendships and relationships, less inclined to initiate conversations with others, less willing to take part in interactions that might involve a degree of ambiguity or awkwardness. Addressing these trends, which have implications for both the cohesiveness of local communities and the ability of young people to contribute effectively to national and multilateral spaces, will require local networks of mutual support, encouragement, and practical accompaniment in youth channeling their energies toward the betterment of their societies. Beyond merely conveying information or even providing access to resources, effective arrangements along these lines would help growing numbers of young people overcome apprehension, summon courage, and arise in constructive action. 

Youth have often not been able to significantly shape or control many of the spaces in which they operate. They do, however, communicate and interact among themselves in a multitude of ways—and in this lies great potential for developing models that are more effective not only for themselves, but for those of any age. Young people in the United Nations system, for example, have noted that youth-focused spaces need to be constantly expanding to include new representatives and voices, that they must not be allowed to collapse down to a small circle of relatively privileged young people. Simple to say, this would require those who already enjoy access to actively invite other youth and refuse to hoard opportunities, for example by potentially declining speaking opportunities in favor of others. Young activists have noted that youth need to be listening to and learning from one another, rather than striving to always reinvent the wheel themselves. They have suggested that young people need to be at the forefront of constructing conceptions of power more appropriate to the needs of an increasingly interdependent world, moving away from concepts of domination and contest and toward norms of collaboration, common cause, and the release of capacity. Oriented along these lines, young people are in no way dependent on the decisions and choices of others. Rather, they have wide latitude to expand the bounds, both practical and moral, of communication and interaction as practiced on the international stage today.

Addressing the challenges of the coming years will require markedly different models of communication and interaction on the international stage and beyond. The Our Common Agenda report of the Secretary-General, for example, calls for fundamental renewal of the social contract, that “understanding within a society of how people solve shared problems, manage risks and pool resources to deliver public goods.” The State bears key institutional responsibility for ensuring arrangements that are just, humane, and effective. Yet the State is not the only actor capable of advancing meaningful social transformation. Young people, too, can—and must—spearhead efforts to develop entirely new patterns of communication and interaction between individuals, communities, and social institutions. 

Young people in every cultural context are embedded in rich networks of family, neighborhood, and community. Such ties are vital to cohesive and harmonious societies, yet civil society organizations and governmental agencies often approach young people in ways that obscure or ignore the social context in which youth function, interacting with them instead as if they were stand-alone, autonomous agents. Opportunities for advancement in programs, for example, often require extensive travel or relocation to far-away localities; expectations of participation and time commitments can come at the expense of young people’s relationships with family members, friends, and other acquaintances. Youth-oriented initiatives therefore have much to learn about communicating and interacting not just with youth themselves, but with the many others who surround them in the broader social context. This can be understood as one response to wider patterns of individualism and disconnection that have grown increasingly common around the world. Youth have much to offer, for example, in developing models of collective volition, united action, and collaborative decision-making. “Leadership is not about the elevation of self,” one young activist noted in a recent forum held at the United Nations. “It’s about the elevation of the community—so that through our action and efforts, more and more people prosper together.” 

Building a better world is the work of all populations and age groups; strengthening patterns of intergenerational partnership will therefore be of vital importance. Many young people today face norms of respect that demand deference and obedience to elders; institutional structures that exclude and marginalize their contributions; and cultural stereotypes that view them as unreliable, inexperienced, or self-absorbed. For their part, many elders face social norms that promote youth culture, habits, and tastes; social institutions that dismiss and discriminate against them; and cultural stereotypes that view them as out of touch, past their prime, and ineffectual. Clearly, entirely new models will need to be developed around how different age cohorts collaborate with one another across the life cycle, including as individuals transition from one stage to the next. In this, youth and young adults are uniquely positioned to collaborate both “upwards” with older colleagues, but also “downwards” with children and adolescents, who look up to and often emulate them. Many activists are also identifying the need for spaces that are highly intergenerational but organized around substantive aims and objectives, rather than designations of age, per se. Such an approach focuses less on bringing those defined as “youth” into contact with those defined as “adults,” than on creating spaces and ongoing processes in which younger and older collaborators are developing experience and knowledge together, working shoulder-to-shoulder and supporting one another over time.

In societies around the world, a growing share of interpersonal engagement is mediated through online channels and platforms. Information and communications technologies (ICT) are therefore central to any consideration of youth and social interaction. Linkages between youth and technology are often overemphasized, as if younger generations’ contributions to a better world could be reduced to writing code or designing apps. Digital technologies hold great promise, of course, but they have already caused considerable harm, as well. Youth are not immune to these dangers simply by having come of age using digital technologies. Indeed, ills such as media addiction, information overload, polarization, radicalization, and shortened attention span can be even more pernicious in a period of life characterized by ongoing neurological development in the brain, as well as psychological development of personal identity and sense of self. But despite these challenges—perhaps even because of them—youth have immense potential to lead the way toward societies engaging digital communications more thoughtfully and using them more constructively. Young people can provide vital insight, for example, into how various technologies can augment and expand meaningful in-person relationships, instead of replacing them. They can explore how emerging technologies can be deployed to advance social goals, instead of society continually adapting itself to the imperatives of each new wave of technological products. Critical in this regard will be individuals, communities, and entire societies learning how to make purposeful, values-informed choices about how technologies will be embraced and employed. Recent developments in artificial intelligence, which have accelerated even further the already rapid pace of technological change, have made it clear that critical values must be consciously embraced and promoted—qualities such as truthfulness, honesty, integrity, and trustworthiness—if communications technologies are to be a source of social benefit and not breakdown. 

Young people communicate and interact through formal structures and institutional mechanisms, many of which are no longer fit for purpose and will need to be reimagined. Equally serious are challenges at the level of daily, person-to-person interaction. Societies around the world are facing growing levels of social anxiety, disconnection, loneliness, and isolation, particularly among younger generations. Many feel less capable of forming meaningful friendships and relationships, less inclined to initiate conversations with others, less willing to take part in interactions that might involve a degree of ambiguity or awkwardness. Addressing these trends, which have implications for both the cohesiveness of local communities and the ability of young people to contribute effectively to national and multilateral spaces, will require local networks of mutual support, encouragement, and practical accompaniment in youth channeling their energies toward the betterment of their societies. Beyond merely conveying information or even providing access to resources, effective arrangements along these lines would help growing numbers of young people overcome apprehension, summon courage, and arise in constructive action. 

Youth have often not been able to significantly shape or control many of the spaces in which they operate. They do, however, communicate and interact among themselves in a multitude of ways—and in this lies great potential for developing models that are more effective not only for themselves, but for those of any age. Young people in the United Nations system, for example, have noted that youth-focused spaces need to be constantly expanding to include new representatives and voices, that they must not be allowed to collapse down to a small circle of relatively privileged young people. Simple to say, this would require those who already enjoy access to actively invite other youth and refuse to hoard opportunities, for example by potentially declining speaking opportunities in favor of others. Young activists have noted that youth need to be listening to and learning from one another, rather than striving to always reinvent the wheel themselves. They have suggested that young people need to be at the forefront of constructing conceptions of power more appropriate to the needs of an increasingly interdependent world, moving away from concepts of domination and contest and toward norms of collaboration, common cause, and the release of capacity. Oriented along these lines, young people are in no way dependent on the decisions and choices of others. Rather, they have wide latitude to expand the bounds, both practical and moral, of communication and interaction as practiced on the international stage today.