When results of Jordan’s
Tawjihi (general secondary education certificate examination) are announced
tomorrow, the streets of Amman will likely be transformed into a maze of
celebrating students hanging from car windows and sunroofs as they race
dangerously through the capital’s already jam-packed streets.
اضافة اعلان
Others will set
off family-owned firearms in
celebratory gunfire, further increasing the risk of
unnecessary injury and death.
The Tawjihi celebrations and other forms of youth
delinquency such as drag racing, underage drinking and smoking, and loitering
are typically written-off as a case of “boys will be boys” (and girls will be
girls) but there are larger looming questions about what this phenomenon means for
the country’s security and stability that often gets ignored.
Over the years, Jordan has fared pretty impressively when
it comes to dealing with cases of radicalization, terrorism, and violence but has
fared rather poorly when it comes to their prevention.
While the argument that youth delinquency could lead to such extremes in
adulthood is far-fetched and a little prudish as well, there is still some truth
behind this.
The lack of respect for authority and other unfavorable behaviors that
are witnessed on numerous issues today does not occur in isolation.
They are partly the result of
the historical inability (or unwillingness) of government to implement the law
and government’s inability to shape societal norms.
Law-breakers have
likely been given a free pass all their lives (no consequences for their
actions) nor have they been shaped to be better citizens (no guidance or norm
setting).
It would be interesting to see, for instance, what happens to those
students involved in campus violence as they reach adulthood given that their
actions go unpunished.
In either case, the hands-off approach that the government
has in dealing with this phenomenon does not bode well for the relationship
between young people and the government as the former get older, and the
country’s overall stability and security.
The principles of good citizenship
that government is supposedly tireless trying to instill in Jordanians cannot
start at a later stage in life.
Youth delinquency also
sheds light on the inability of government to provide outlets and alternatives
for young people as they navigate their teenage years and beyond.
Most young
people in Jordan have little else to do in the summertime other than roam the
streets in their cars until the early hours of the morning; young males in
particular are not welcome anywhere.
Unbeknownst to many, one of the reasons for
the introduction of Taekwondo in Jordan in the late 1970s and early 1980s was
to curtail youth delinquency and get young people off the street, just as Judo
was part of the British government’s attempt to prevent young people from
joining gangs.
While youth has been a very topical and trendy subject for government,
at least since the onset of the Arab Spring, it seems that not enough is being
done.
The authorities tend to
have an all-or-nothing approach to addressing these types of issues.
Adopting a
heavy-handed approach to youth delinquency is not the solution and could be a
catalyst for further youth disenfranchisement.
Another wrong approach would be
for government to throw this issue into the laps of security institutions to
solve.
The solution lies with a combination of good social engineering and
community policing; two policy approaches that are rarely in use.
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Opinion and Analysis
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