OxPeace 2022 Session 3: Part 4

This presentation will briefly canvass the evolution of the global policy on youth, peace and security and some of the issues of exclusion, embedded stereotypes, trust deficits and ‘policy panic’ that it has sought to address. It will go on to review some of the seismic shifts that ‘meaningful inclusion’ of young people demands of the peacebuilding sector and will review the implementation and attempts at ‘localization’ of this framework, including an outline of some of the gaps and opportunities in addressing the aspirations of young women and men at national and local levels. The presentation will explore the transversal roles, attributes and hurdles of inclusive and intersectional youth-based peacebuilding across sectors, typologies of violence, phases of peace and conflict, and from the local to the global levels. It will conclude with a brief outline of the prevention potential of transformative youth resilience at all these levels, with an eye on the prevailing challenges of digital technologies, systemic (racial) injustice, the imperative of decolonization of the peacebuilding field, and the existential threat of climate change.