Understanding Nepali Youth’s Community Participation in the Post-Disaster Context

Abstract

As Nepal witnessed the significant contribution of youth in the 2015 earthquake crisis, their community participation received nation-wide attention and acknowledgement (GoN, 2015, and Sherriff, 2016); however, a little attention has been paid to understand their participation practices and perspectives. Witnessing youth active participation in the community, this study has attempted to explore their engagement in the post-disaster context of Nepal by using Cornwall’s (2000a) situated practices, and Stammers’ (2009) paradox of institutionalization as conceptual frameworks. This study adopted Participatory Action Research (PAR) method to explore the nature of youth engagement, factors for their community (dis)engagement, and youth’s conceptualization of participation based on their own lived experiences. 36 Nepali youth, who were actively engaged in the community (seven as co-researchers and 29 as research participants), participated in this study. Data were collected using Cooperative Inquiry (CI) workshops, interviews and focus group discussions, field visits, and social media content analysis. Later, data were analyzed using thematic analysis; and five key themes emerged from the collected data. These themes not only illustrated how youth were engaged in complex and hybrid ways, but also revealed the influence of socio-cultural and economic situation, and institutional practices on youth (dis)engagement in the community. The study exhibits the necessity of incorporating youth’s perspectives on participation and changing youth participation practices rather than mere adult-centric narratives of youth participation or institution-driven, tokenistic and unsustainable youth mobilization practices in Nepal.