The Political Economy of Contemporary Youth in Cameroon

Abstract This paper is a conjecture on Cameroon's socioeconomic prospects and trajectory between now (2020) and the mid-point of this century. Gazing into the future is a necessary chore. Any scientist venturing outside the Ivory tower will invariably be invited to join policy efforts to plan the future or, at least, to debate possible scenarios and steer societies away from the least desirable outcomes. While these policy efforts initially sought to plan national growth, they have expanded in scale and scope with new international compacts to advance sustainable development worldwide. Today, African nations must prepare their national development alongside a panoply of goals from the United Nations' SDG and the Africa Union's 2063 agendas. This paper is at once a case study of Cameroon's political economy, a substantive hypothesis, and a methodological tool for forecasting the future of African societies in a context of educational expansion, demographic transition, and economic divergence. Its central thesis is that Cameroon has a real opportunity to turn its current generation of youth into its greatest. Seizing this potential depends on strategic efforts to cultivate and empower this generation along economic, demographic, social, and political spheres.