Needs and Expectations of Youth in Africa not Met Despite Improved Public Governance

Approximately three out of four Africans live in a country where public governance has improved over the past 10 years. These improvements, however, do not meet the needs and expectations of the youth.

Faced with unprecedented demographic growth, key governance areas are not progressing fast enough to keep up with rising demands. More than 60 percent of the continent’s population and are still expected to increase their number by almost 20 percent in the next decade.

The 2018 IIAG report shows that over the past decade, public governance in Africa remains on average on a moderate upward trajectory, mainly driven by progress in Gender, Health, and Infrastructure.

Many positive trends emerge from this year’s index. Thirty-four out of 54 African countries have improved in Overall Governance over the past decade, with 15 of these having accelerated their pace of improvement in the past five years. Among those, Côte d’Ivoire, Morocco, and Kenya display the most impressive progression, stepping up from 41st, 25th, and 19th ranks out of 54 countries to 22nd, 15th, and 11th over the past decade, respectively.

On the continent, improvements stand out in indicators related to Health, the most improved of the 14 sub-categories of the IIAG over the past decade, as well as in Gender and Infrastructure. There are also recent and welcome improvements in Rule of Law and Transparency & Accountability, even if scores in the latter are still low.

Considering Africa’s youth population growth, it is concerning to see the recent downturn of the African average score for Education. For 27 countries—half of the African countries—Education scores registered deterioration in the past five years, meaning that education outcomes are worsening for more than half (52.8 percent) of Africa’s youth.

Though enrollment levels are higher, this concerning drop is driven by a fall in the indicators measuring whether education is meeting the needs of the economy, as well as education quality and citizens’ expectations of education provision.

In a world of globalized information and multiplying social networks, Africa’s growing number of young citizens also ask for better rights and participation.

Progress in Participation & Human Rights has been registered, and almost 4 out of 5 of Africa’s citizens (79.6 percent) live in countries that have progressed in this dimension over the past decade.

However, the increased number of free and fair executive elections does not necessarily translate into a better participatory environment. Alarmingly, citizens’ political and civic space in Africa is shrinking, with worsening trends in indicators measuring civil society participation, civil rights and liberties, freedom of expression, and freedom of association and assembly.

Also, strong macroeconomic growth over the past decade has failed to translate into progress in Sustainable Economic Opportunity for citizens, namely the extent to which governments enable their citizens to pursue economic goals and provide the opportunity to prosper.

While Africa’s combined GDP has increased by almost 40 percent over the past decade, average progress has been almost null for citizens in Sustainable Economic Opportunity. Even if some countries do manage to register progress, almost half (43.2 percent) of Africa’s citizens live in one of the 25 countries where Sustainable Economic Opportunity has declined over the past 10 years.

The almost stagnant trend then strikes a concerning contrast with demographic growth and youth expectations. Africa’s population has increased by 26 percent over the past 10 years and 60 percent of the continent’s 1.25 billion people are now under the age of 25 years old.