A Generation on the Move - Insights into the Conditions, Aspirations and Activism of Arab Youth

Historians may well look back one day and record that modern history in the Middle East and North Africa and even across the world marked a decisive turning point starting in December 2010, due in large measure to the collective sentiments and coordinated activities of hundreds of thousands of young men and women in half a dozen Arab countries. The trajectory and consequences of the current political, social and economic transformations rippling across the Arab world will become clear in the years ahead. For now, we are collectively challenged to understand the driving forces for the momentous changes underway, and the underlying causes that sparked them. Enormous energy and talent are being unleashed across the Arab region, as adults and youth alike start to reconfigure some of the basic institutions of their societies; in the fields of representative governance, education, private business, culture and the arts, foreign policy, and social development. This report is an attempt to act on the need to better understand the stirrings that already were obvious in the minds, worldviews and behavior of many young Arabs, but that had been manifested primarily in the private or the virtual realms - and not yet in the street and other public spaces.