Engaging Youth for Sustainable Development: Field Lessons from Community Sustainability Global

Abundant empirical evidence and studies tell us youth (age 15-24) have some potential to facilitate sustainable development (SD) policy and action, including awareness and activism, agenda setting, formulation, legitimation, decision-making and implementation. However, we know more about their activism and implementation role in the global north than south, especially Africa. Also, of the three basic pillars — economic, social, and environmental — of
SD, youth are often reported and visibly seen to be more active on the environmental front, especially SD goal 13: climate action. While they could also foster economic and social sustainability, we know too little about that potential. To contribute to filling these gaps, we ask what youth could do to enhance the three pillars of SD across the global north and south. We use an international project, Community Sustainability Global (CSG), as a case study to answer the question, drawing on workshop preparation and interaction, feedback surveys and interviews. Among other findings, our results show that youth contribute not only to promoting SD policy and action but could also tell us more about knowledge mobilization on scientific and policy loopholes.