Youth Unemployment Topic Summary: Many youth worldwide are struggling with finding formal employment opportunities, or are paid very low wages when they are working. In both developing and developed countries, there are gaps between formal education and employment. Youth in this case are usually between 15-24 years of age. According to the International Labor Organization, “young people are three times more likely to be unemployed than adults and almost 73 million youth worldwide are looking for work”. The ILO has cautioned and warned of a damaged generation of young workers facing a dangerous mix of high unemployment, increased inactivity and hazardous work in developed countries, as well as persistently high working poverty in the developing world. This could potentially lead to an economic crisis with a generation with little work experience, or opportunities to actually live a prosperous and developed life. Youth unemployment has many long-term penalties for the individual and for their country. Some individual consequences involve finding employment in unrelated or unfulfilling tracks. For some countries, high youth unemployment causes youth to leave the country in search of employment. High youth unemployment has also led to social unrest and political revolutions.
Background Information: • 2000: UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, first proposes the Youth Employment Network. Following the Secretary-General’s initiative, Heads of State and Government, meeting at the Millennium Summit resolve to "develop and implement strategies that give young people everywhere a real chance to find decent and productive work." The Youth Employment Network becomes a vehicle for mobilizing action around the Millennium Commitment on decent and productive work for young people. The ILO agrees to host the secretariat of the YEN. • 2001: Kofi Annan appoints a High-Level Panel of twelve experts and practitioners on youth employment to advise on youth employment policy and mobilize support for youth employment worldwide. The High Level Panel produces a set of policy recommendations focusing on four global priorities for youth employment: Employability, Equal opportunities, Entrepreneurship, and Employment creation; youth participation; the promotion of Lead countries, and the preparation of national action plans on youth employment. The UN General Assembly adopts a resolution on promoting youth employment which translates the strategic vision of the High-Level Panel into a strong and focused intergovernmental mandate. This resolution encourages all UN Member States to prepare national action plans on youth employment and invites the YEN to prepare a global analysis and evaluation of these action plans. • 2002: YEN secretariat is established, hosted by the ILO (Geneva). The Swedish International Development Agency provides funding to support the work of the secretariat. Three countries volunteer to become YEN Lead Countries: Indonesia, Namibia and Sri Lanka. • 2003: First YEN Newsletter produced. The number of Lead countries increases to seven: Azerbaijan, Brazil, Egypt, Indonesia, Namibia, Senegal and Sri Lanka. • 2004: The YCG is launched to act as an advisory body to the YEN. It comprises 13 representatives of international and regional youth organizations and is working to represent the concerns of young people on the function, direction and priorities of the YEN. It interacts with the HLP and provides input into decision making processes. 1st YEN Lead Country Meeting is held in Lubbock, Germany. Iran, Mali, Nigeria, Rwanda join the YEN. YEN receives support from German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) to coordinate NAP development in two Lead countries – Senegal and Sri Lanka and conduct a global inventory of good practices on youth employment. • 2005: A High-Level Dialogue with Partners of the YEN on "Bringing Youth Employment into the International Development Agenda" is held in Geneva, with funding from the World Bank. 2nd YEN Lead Country Meeting, hosted by Jamaica, is held in New York during the 60th session of the United Nations General Assembly. The focus of the meeting is to discuss progress in formulating and implementing National Action Plans, identifying political, technical, and financial keys to overcome youth employment challenges. The YEN increases to 17 Lead Countries. D R Congo, Ecuador, Jamaica, Syria, Uganda and UK join. • 2006: Swedish International Development Agency renews its support to the work of the secretariat for a further three years. The YEN secretariat expands, opening an office to address youth employment issues in West Africa (YEN-WA). The office is hosted by United Nations Office for West Africa in Dakar, Senegal and is supported by UK funding. YEN’s High Level Panel fulfils its mandate. Two more countries join the YEN: Georgia, Turkey. • 2007: YENs Youth Consultative Group (YCG) launches “Joining Forces with Young People: A Practical Guide to Collaboration for Youth Employment”, a tool to facilitate young peoples’ participation in youth employment policy-making, at the UN General Assembly. • 2008: 3rd Lead Country Meeting is held in Geneva on “Establishing Benchmarks for successful Youth Employment Policies/Programs”, supported by the UK government. Participants include representatives of the Ministries of Labor and technicians playing a key role in designing and implementing National Action Plans (NAPs) and employment and evaluation specialists from the World Bank and International Labor Organization (ILO). The UK government renews it financial support to YEN-WA for a third year. The Report of the status of NAPs in YEN Lead Countries is updated; 7 countries are in the development stage; 1 has drafted the NAP, 6 are at the implementation phase and 1 country is in the process of evaluating their NAP. • 2009: YEN and ILO sign a $23 million agreement with the Danish Lead Africa Commission to deliver support to young entrepreneurs in East Africa (Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya). 4th Lead County meeting is held in Lusaka, Zambia on "Benchmarking and Best Practices in Youth Employment". The event is sponsored by the Commonwealth Youth Program, the ILO and the UK Department for Work and Pensions. 17 countries renew their commitment.
Issues to be Addressed in a Resolution: • How can job skills and training be improved for young people? • Why aren’t there enough jobs for young people? • How can youth unemployment be reduced while not crowding out older people who currently have jobs or lack jobs? • How can security be maintained for disaffected, unemployed younger people?
Bibliography:
• "ANC Youth League." ANC Youth League. http://www.ancyl.org.za/show.php?id=5525 (accessed January 8, 2014).
• "Informal, poorly paid and unemployed: The reality of work for most youth in developing countries." Global Employment Trends for Youth 2013: http://ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_212917/lang-- en/index.htm (accessed January 8, 2014). • "Spotlight on US Youth." Spotlight on US Youth. http://www.ilo.org/washington/ilo- and-the-united-states/spot-light-on-the-us-labor-market/spot-light-on-us- youth/lang--en/index.htm (accessed January 7, 2014).
• "Youth Employment Network Timeline." Youth Employment Network Timeline. http://www.ilo.org/public/english/employment/yen/about/timeline.htm (accessed January 8, 2014).
• "Youth employment." Youth employment. http://www.ilo.org/global/topics/youth- employment/lang--en/index.htm (accessed January 8, 2014).
• "Youth unemployment crisis needs urgent attention." United Nations Multimedia, Radio, Photo and Television. http://www.unmultimedia.org/radio/english/2013/06/youth-unemployment-crisis- needs-urgent-attention/ (accessed January 8, 2014).
Mass Bribery of Public Employees
Topic Summary: Grafting, or political corruption and bribery, enforces illegal economic and social actions. It is highly condemned in the United Nations, though there are many nations which do not enforce much action against grafting. As a result, money earmarked for humanitarian aid or development is illegally spent elsewhere. Political corruption is defined as “the use of power by government officials for illegitimate private gain.” This includes bribery of public officials. Countries with relatively unstable governments are more prone to corruption.
Background Information: • 4 December 2000: The General Assembly recognized an effective international laws against corruption, were desirable and decided to establish a committee for the negotiation of such laws in Vienna at the headquarters of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. • 31 October 2003: the General Assembly adopted the United Nations Convention against Corruption. The Convention entered into force in December 2005. • 31 October 2003: The Assembly also designated 9 December as International Anti- Corruption Day, to raise awareness of corruption.
Issues to be Addressed in a Resolution: 1) How can the UN help lower the use of bribery, especially among public employees who are being put in danger through illegal actions? 2) How can the UN encourage countries to actually implement rules against grafting and bribery? 3) What actions need to be taken to enforce/punish graft and bribery? 4) How can nations which lack resources police bribery among its public employees
Bibliography: http://www.antigraft.org/pages/un-treaties-and-resolutions http://nigeriannewspapers.disnaija.com/guardian-nigeria/un-body-wants-nigeria-to- implement-rules-against-graft/ http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/785909.shtml#.UflMsI3VCSo http://www.businessinsider.com/the-most-corrupt-countries-in-the-world-2013-12 http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/treaties/CAC/
Unions in Developing Countries Topic Summary: Developing countries face a much different battle over the existence of unions than the United States and other western powers. Some researchers and politicians believe that unions in developing countries have adverse effects. For example, differences between union and non-union labor wages are large and create a disparity in how much workers are making. This effect is debatable with some arguing unions will naturally protect workers in developing countries. Unionism has also been argued to create a higher share of compensation with higher productivity. However, it would unrealistic to think that developing countries could replicate unions like those in the United States or other more economically developed nations.
Background Information: Labor unions arose as a way for workers to organize around the mid 1800’s. In the U.S. labor unions have been both strengthened and at times dismantled by various policies. Economists have been split over whether labor unions have a substantial effect on worker protection or if simply result in fewer jobs at higher wages. The International Labor Organization was formed in 1919 in the League of Nations and eventually became a part of the UN. In the UN’s Declaration of Human Rights articles 23 and 24 deal with workers rights including a clause stating every worker has the right to form trade unions for the protection of his interests.
Issues to be addressed in a Resolution: 1. Are unions beneficiary to developing nations? 2. If so, how can the UN help support the creation of successful labor unions in developing nations? 3. If not, how can the UN help discourage the formation of unions in developing nations without causing political unrest? 3. Is it possible to create labor unions that are still culturally and ethically acceptable to the nations developing them?
Bibliography: http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/71508/george-c-lodge/labors-role-in-newly- developing-countries http://elibrary.worldbank.org/doi/book/10.1596/1813-9450-1469 http://www.hrw.org/world-report-2012/world-report-2012-landmark-victory-domestic- workers http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michelle-chen/ban-ki-moon-accused-of- un_b_3943475.html http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/20029387?uid=18709&uid=3739736&uid=2&uid =3&uid=18708&uid=5911192&uid=67&uid=62&uid=3739256&sid=21103462899803 http://www.nber.org/papers/w14789.pdf http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/71508/george-c-lodge/labors-role-in-newly- developing-countries http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2010/dec/09/trade- union-workers-rights-development