The National Joins with Middle East Youth Initiative for "Young in the Muslim World" series

Abu-Dhabi based newspaper The National has published a series, "Young in the Muslim World," in cooperation with the Middle East Youth Initiative. The series features stories "of the people and institutions that are providing hope and opportunity to the region’s young," examining the difficulties faced by young people in securing jobs, shifting gender roles in the Gulf states, increased volunteerism among Egypt's young, and relationships between young people and their parents and family.

The interactive feature and articles are accessible here.

• In “A new generation for a new world” (12 October 2008), Craig Nelson and Hamida Ghafour write that, as young people struggle to “reinvent” themselves within the framework of an increasingly interconnected, global economy, "the contrast between life as it is lived and life as it could be has never been greater." What are the aspirations of these youth, and how can their social and economic environment contribute toward the achievement of their goals?

  Navtej Dhillon, Director of the Middle East Youth Initiative and Fellow at the Wolfensohn Center for Development at Brookings, notes that the region's oil boom and economic prosperity comes with certain risks that may negatively skew the relationship between youth and the institutions that surround them: “there is a risk of creating distorted incentives which reinforce behaviour such as high subsidies for housing [and] inflated salaries for public sector jobs."

  Diane Singerman, Middle East Youth Initiative expert and author of The Economic Imperatives of Marriage: Emerging Practices and Identities Among Youth in the Middle East, speaks about the extended period of adolescence that results as young people increasingly delay marriage due to financial constraints.

• In "Single in the Emirates" (12 October 2008) the National focuses on young women from the Gulf states that are increasingly moving to Dubai to live and work on their own, evidence of what some would say are evolving norms that previously would consider young, single women living on their own as culturally taboo. Paul Dyer, Research Associate at the Dubai School of Government, says: “They can come to Dubai, work professionally, get an apartment of their own or live with a brother for example,” he said. “It is a lifestyle that provides them with independence and they maintain a life they couldn’t get anywhere else in the Gulf.” 

• In “Charity is the spur for restless youth” (14 October 2008), Hamida Ghafour examines of the growing spirit of voluntary service in Egypt, and the factors that motivate young people to engage in charity work. The article cites Youth Exclusion in Egypt, a Middle East Youth Initiative working paper, and includes interviews with youth working with Resala, the largest youth volunteer organisation in the country.

Additional articles in the series include:

• “Arab youth: the promise and the challenges” (11 October 2008)

• “Lost in adolescent limbo” (12 October 2008)

• “In Kuwait, bloggers are big news” (13 October 2008)

• “The kids are all right: a testament to the optimism of youth” (13 October 2008)

• “Bridging the gender gap” (13 October 2008)