Rise Up: Understanding Youth Social Entrepreneurs and Their Ecosystems
By Laura Peracchio and Melissa G. Bublitz
Youth are a powerful force for positive change in the world. A growing number of young people who care about a wide array of issues—gun reform, climate change, education, racial justice, health care, and voting rights—are rising up to take action on these vital social issues and, in doing so, shaping their own and society’s collective future. Across the globe, young people are growing impatient with inaction; they will not allow ignorance and inertia to win. Following the tradition of youth-led movements that have changed the world by fighting for civil rights in the United States, eradicating corruption in Brazil, and ending dictatorships around the world, youth changemakers are taking positive action to create societal change. They are working to accomplish a mission codified by our research partner, Future Coalition—a youth-founded and youth-led social action organization— to make the future a better, safer, and more just place for everyone.
In our research, we partnered with Future Coalition’s Katie Eder, and twenty other youth changemakers, to understand why youth take action to create social change and to develop practices for supporting youth in their changemaking journey. We use this lens—youth as changemakers who can make the world a better place—to understand youth changemakers and to identify the ecosystem that helps them to thrive. We explore the mindset of these young changemakers and their constantly-changing ecosystem, focusing on key influencers and essential resources that foster youth on their changemaking journey.
The young changemakers we partnered with share a set of characteristics that we call the youth changemaker mindset. This mindset includes a set of mental habits and traits that include a growth mindset, personal agency and self-efficacy, optimism and hope, empathy, a ‘we’ focus, and intrinsic motivation and passion for making the world a better place. It is vital to acknowledge that youth changemakers do not emerge or thrive in isolation. They are embedded in a network of influencers. These influencers are the people who impact, shape, nurture, and sometimes inhibit the youth changemaker. This influencer network includes parents, teachers and other adult allies, peers, and organizations such as their schools and their community and religious institutions.
For our youth changemaker partners, it is clear that access to four types of resources are particularly critical for changemaking:funding, having a virtual or real world place for changemaking, access to technology, and access to changemaking knowledge and skills. Virtually all of our youth changemaker partners reported that obtaining needed funding is one of their key challenges. As Katie Eder explained, in youth organizing, “Everything revolves around money. Everything costs money, from applying for a permit to organize a protest, to the day-to-day costs of running an organization. And it’s so sad how it can definitely become a barrier for a lot of kids.”
So, what can adults do to fuel the fire in youth changemakers? Adult allies can help youth develop the confidence and personal agency to act on what they know, what they think, and what they feel. Many of the young changemakers we partnered with credited parents or teachers with encouraging and supporting them. As one youth changemaker recounted, “My parents have always told me that if there’s a problem, you can do something about it. I was raised with the mentality to take action now. Change things. Don’t wait for others to change it for you.”
Our research finds that engaging in changemaking benefits youth changemakers’ well-being and mental health. Although these changemakers are fueled by their passion, the work of organizing and fighting for change can feel like an uphill battle that drags on as each small victory is met by new challenges. According to Katie Eder, a vital well-being practice for sustaining youth changemaking is this: Rest is Resistance. In a culture, where we are encouraged to keep going and doing 24/7, the practice of Rest is an act of resistance against dominant cultural forces. Rest is important to our physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing. Rest helps changemakers reconnect with other aspects of their lives as a student, a family member, a friend, a creative being with diverse talents and interests. Rest provides an opportunity to recharge, reflect, and regroup as they prepare for the next battle. Rest sustains youth changemakers—and all of us—as we Rise Up to make the future a brighter place for everyone.
Article details
Rise Up: Understanding Youth Social Entrepreneurs and Their Ecosystems
Melissa G. Bublitz, Lan Nguyen Chaplin, Laura A. Peracchio, Ashley Deutsch Cermin, Mentor Dida, Jennifer Edson Escalas, Meike Eilert, Alexei Gloukhovtsev, Elizabeth G. Miller.
First Published August 4, 2020
DOI: 10.1177/0743915620937702
Journal of Public Policy & Marketing
About the Authors
