Youth Mainstreaming in Development Planning: Transforming Young Lives aims to meet requests from member countries for timely, relevant guidance on integrating youth rights into institutional planning.
‘Transformation’ (a radical change for the good) suggests an ambitious goal, and often requires re-evaluating the ways we work, partners we work with, and the ultimate results we want to achieve for, and with, youth. By ‘development planning’ we mean all aspects of the planning cycle, including policy and strategy development and translating strategy into programmes, and thereby, outcomes for youth.
The publication echoes United Nations Resolution No. 70/1, which released the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), titled Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (Agenda 2030). Global transformation is possible only if young people contribute to, and benefit from, this transformation. While the authors acknowledge that youth aspirations may go beyond the SDGs, they still provide a strong foundation for our work given the SDGs’ central commitment to reducing inequality, the goal of mainstreaming.