Ten years of change
It's been a happy week for Common Weal celebrating our ten year anniversary. To all those who support us thank you very much, you're the reason we're still alive and kicking.
In the ten years that Common Weal has been creating policy for the betterment of Scotland a lot has changed. A time before Brexit, before Covid, or before Trump was president. You could go on and on, there’s been a fair amount packed into a decade. For the young people of Scotland their current position in society is also different. Ten years ago I was still in school having just voted in the referendum but now I begrudgingly call myself an adult. So how have things changed for the current young people in Scotland and how are they likely to change for the next generation?
Breakthroughs even in the last decade has seen technology become an integrated part of everyday life. We’re way past the first ever iPhone or App, we’ve now got to consider the possibility of AI taking over our lives.
Social media plays a huge role in the lives of young people like it or not. Ten years ago the emergence of social media still wasn’t new. However a decade on we now know that social media is disastrous for their mental health. It's an unregulated drug that we've been handing out for free.
We have mountains of evidence and discourse on the matter. Even adults aren’t handling social media well and yet young people are having to navigate the doom-scrolling, the influencers, the body-shaming, and a world where reality and inauthenticity morph into one. Even the likes of a head of state can hop on Twitter or X, or whatever and spout nonsense. Without life experience under your belt it’s easy to get lost and sucked in. And it can leave the door-open for a whole plethora of nasty outcomes.
The avalanche of mental health problems effecting young people can be attributed to the rise of social media. Of course there are other factors such as poverty, loneliness after Covid, awareness and readiness to diagnose of mental health conditions but it is no coincidence that the rise of depression among teens comes at the same time smartphones landed in their hands.
What will the next ten years bring in the way of protection. The Online Safety Act is a very minimal start, it doesn’t do nearly enough in the way of holding social media companies to account for the damage they cause. It will also be interesting to see in the next ten years the generations that grew up with social media and smart technology leading these industries. What will they do? Having been exposed to the harms will the next generation push back, or make it even more addictive?
AI also poses a number of questions, as the young people of Scotland will soon be growing up in a very different world. There are a mass of benefits AI can bring but like everything in life there are drawbacks to such brilliance. For example, what will the job market look like in the next decade for young people just starting out? AI will inevitably bring with it job losses, it already has, but it has the potential to bring a new field of work. And after all there is no AI without humans, and if ever that isn’t the case we are in big trouble.
Politics has changed an immense amount in the past decade. I mean ten years ago we were a member of the EU, which seems a lifetime ago. The rise of populism, polarisation and misinformation has been very apparent. Covid most definitely became an accelerator in all three cases. It would have seemed inconceivable ten years ago that we would have had Trump as president tweeting the ‘supreme leader’ of North Korea, increasing the likelihood of nuclear war. Democracy delivered via social media is now the norm, and world politics seems to have become a lot more fragile in the process.
Our trust in politicians has lessened. Both in the UK and in Scotland. Will this leave the next generation a lot more cynical and faithless in the system as a whole? On the other hand young people are getting involved, the rise of fringe groups, protests, and social movements has seen a whole host of new groups fighting for what they believe in. Although social media has a lot to answer for it has been able to mobilise large sways of people to fight for what’s right, and young people have been at the forefront of that.
The independence movement is still alive and kicking, perhaps having temporarily lost some vision and direction but the passion and need is still present. The young Scots who will soon be voting and immersing themselves in politics will hopefully find a place in the independence movement. It’s most likely that the young people of today will help Scotland gain independence in the future, as the idea of independence becomes normal and the absurdity of being part of the UK becomes apparent.
Inevitably the young people of Scotland will be the generation who will have to desperately navigate the consequences of the climate crisis and hopefully be part of the solution. Looking back at the last decade it is hard not to get disheartened, it seems that we were on the cusp of seeing some good commitments but in the last year or so it has all fallen apart. The young people over the last decade have grown up with phrases like “climate change”, “greenhouse gases”, and “carbon emissions” in their everyday life. Yet as the most aware generation they have been failed by the generations that have come before them (well those making the decisions anyway).
In the next decade those growing up will have to bear the brunt of what’s to come. Further climate events (as I write this the devastation of the recent Spanish floods has become apparent), the creation of mass climate refugees and the insecurity to their home and food supply. Climate change is already a worry that most young people of the last decade have grown up with but it seems that the next group will be even more adversely effected.
But staying positive, Scotland's young people represent the future and it will be interesting to follow how the choose to overcome their obstacles. There is a great enthusiasm and want to produce a better world. We already have the tools, we know what has to be done, we just need our leaders to have the courage and integrity to do the right thing.
So here's to the next ten years