Given the profile of the audience and the nature of the organisation that has kindly invited me to chair this remarkable event, it might be unfair of me to speak seemingly against the concept of youth leadership. However, as I’m just under thirty and a proud alumnus of AIESEC itself, I feel I have the license to avoid the necessary “motherhood and apple-pie” statements about “free spirits” and cut to some of the serious challenges facing youth leadership. I will start by briefly highlighting two examples, one historical and one contemporary, that demonstrate some of the strikingly real dangers that youth leadership can fall to. From these, I will generalise four core obstacles that leaders must wrestle with in order to avoid such disaster. Finally, I shall describe what the world might learn from youth leaders should they master their puzzle of immaturity before the dreary and dangerous acceptance of age befalls them.

Case 1: Youth “Red Guards” in China’s Cultural Revolution

In the year that followed May 1966, a movement of students and young people would begin by denouncing the administration of their local university, grow to over ten million members drawn from almost every school in China, and just as rapidly be forcibly repressed by the national Army. In these twelve short months, a campaign of terror led by these “Red Guards” would result in hundreds of thousands dead and disabled, large swathes of political arrests from every sector of society, a large percentage of historical sites destroyed, and would firmly establish the personality cult of Mao Zedong.

Chairman Mao had quickly recognised the potential that youthful disdain for establishment, limited critical thinking and boundless ideological energy would offer his “cultural revolution”. Within days of the first Red Guard formation he and his political organs encouraged the youth to embrace their “right to rebel”, directing them to revitalize the revolutionary spirit of the Chinese Communist Party as they saw fit, and to attack the ‘Four Olds” of Chinese society (old customs, old culture, old habits and old ideas). Mao himself gave validation to the destruction stating that mass purges and all such related social and political phenomena were justified and right.

“Freed from parental and societal constraints, youths, both girls and boys, had been unleashed to perpetrate assault, battery, and murder upon their fellow citizens to the extent their barely formed consciences permitted” (Mao’s Last Revolution, Macfarquhar &Schoenhals, 2006).

Once Mao had consolidated his political power the Red Guards were viewed as a liability. They were disempowered, actively suppressed and ultimately exiled through the “Down to the Countryside” movement, in which millions of young urban Chinese were resettled in rural areas. Much of the youthful idealism turned to disillusionment, but not before it had caused massive death and untold political, economic and cultural damage.

Case 2: Julius Malema, President of the ANC Youth League

The South African revolution, in the ending of the apartheid state, is striking in what it lacked of China’s cultural revolution. There was no massive bloodletting, demagoguery or savage persecution. Instead it featured electoral participation, economic empowerment, and “truth and reconciliation”. It is hard to overstate Mandela’s role in forging this climate and the national unity necessary to complete the most painful labour of the new South African state. Forty years before Mandela became President of the ANC (African National Congress) and then of South Africa, he was founder and then President of their Youth League (ANCYL), a platform he used to revitalize and redirect the ANC itself.

Sixty years later, the current President of the ANCYL is one Julius Malema. He has been described by the current South African President Jacob Zuma as “the future leader of South Africa”, and by others as a demagogue, a reckless populist, a puppet, and puppet master. In any interpretation he is a major figure in the political landscape, and for me he embodies a great many lessons on the shadow side of youth leadership.

Even almost twenty years after Mandela’s release South Africa is a fragile society, whose tender wounds are guarded by layers of social and political of taboo around violence, race, economic disparity and class. Malema’s rhetoric has confronted them all. He has been outspoken on the nationalisation of the mining sector, declaring in Harare that “In SA we are just starting. Here in Zimbabwe you are already very far.” He complained that “minorities” (whites, Coloureds and Indians) ran what he defined as the “economic cluster” in the South African cabinet. He has suggested violent means implicitly and even explicitly as when he stated, “Let us make it clear now: we are prepared to die for (President) Zuma. Not only that, we are prepared to take up arms and kill for Zuma.”

Malema is not a man to be cowed easily. Censured by the ANC and directly critiqued by Zuma himself multiple times, he has continued unperturbed. His biographer states, “[Malema] believes that if you criticise him you are either a reactionary or a racist”, and in South Africa this is more than a politically correct riposte (The World according to Julius Malema, Max du Preez, 2010). It is difficult to convey his manner in text, but a short viewing of his April 2010 encounter with a BBC journalist provides an immediate and frightening revelation of character and judgment.

A charismatic, street-wise, young politician, Malema understands his constituency and embodies the confidence and power that a people, who have worryingly little of either, are understandably attracted to. What will result of this leadership, we shall all soon discover.

Observations and lessons drawn

The individual and collective cases, drawn from such different contexts, provide rich examples from the shadow side of youth leadership. I will focus on four key observations that I believe have clear and important application for contemporary youth leaders from all sectors of society.

Lack of critical thinking. As Voltaire put it so powerfully, “those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities”, and indeed it was a lack of critical thinking that allowed the Red Guards actions to transcend their own basic humanity and may allow Malema to transgress on his. In both examples this poverty of reason was created by three forces. First, an attachment to an overly ideological lens in which their political philosophy trumps evidence from reality. Second, a lack of appreciation of their own history, the complexity and depth of the hard fought lessons that challenge such simplistic visions. Third, poor quality education that did not give them the necessary rational skills to see through propaganda and engage in productive political dialogue.

However, this shadow side of leadership should also remind us that there is a positive that casts this shadow. Lack of critical thinking, falls as a shadow from the affinity for new modes of thought that prevails in youth. These new modes recognise that many traditional barriers and conventions are illusionary constrictions that we can overthrow at will. They can recognise valuable innovations and ideals free from the blinding curse of prejudice.

Desire for power and for impact. Malema’s behaviour and rhetoric strongly suggests one most dangerous leadership characteristic—the untempered desire for power and impact. When the true motivation is the reinforcement of one’s ego, a leader will lose sight of the original inequality that inspired their efforts and no consequence of their actions will be enough to break this well fed addiction. Hunger for power results in the belief in the leader’s absolute necessity, and with this belief leader stops serving their people and becomes their master. Furthermore, when change itself becomes the goal, either to validate one’s existence or solely to bring down some established structure, swift destruction can be done to the slow aggregate of the ages.

Desire for power and impact can conceal the positive desire to create a better world—the thirst for greater fulfilment, equity, justice, and beauty that drives much of youthful action. It is a powerful ideal that suggests that the human condition can be better, that the sufferings of the present can be alleviated in the future. Activated by the sense of individual responsibility and empowerment to make this change, young people can be undeniable force for organisational and social transformation.

Manipulation by establishment leaders. The idealism of the Red Guards was clearly manipulated for inter-factional infighting and then they were tossed aside. Similarly, Malema was encouraged to be highly outspoken, and thus influential, in the Zuma’s election and is now starting to become a liability for the establishment. Thus we see that through both empowerment and disempowerment establishment leaders often manipulate the ambitions, philosophy and constituency of youth leaders.

Nonetheless, the positive reciprocation of this deficit is equally true, youth can transform establishment institutions. Just as Mandela utilised the ANCYL as a lever to change the political establishment, youth leaders can bring their undeniable wellspring of energy, ideals and innovation to revitalise and redirect conventional organisations in remarkable ways.

Lack of empathy for those different from oneself. In both cases we see a demonization of “the other”, a view that makes our opponents fundamentally different from ourselves, and thus undeserving of human empathy. This division is nurtured by a number of traits unfortunately common in the thinking of the young; the hasty clarity of a “black and white” perspective, the “other existence” denying view of solipsism or egoism, and the inability to imagine that there are many ways to see, be, and think in this life.

This characteristic is a shadow of the youthful tendency to identify strongly with one’s community. Young people build a large part of their self-image through identifying with peer networks, social communities, and their role models. As these circles of identity expand beyond family, community, religion, and nation state, the welfare of ever expanding segments of humanity becomes important to the individual, and an expanded social consciousness results.

Conclusion

From these very different cases I’ve drawn a picture of youth leadership, which I hope is provocative, relevant to the individual readers own journey, and deeply tied to challenges in the real world. However, I’ve only drawn a few short strands from the rich web of history tied into each of these stories. I encourage the reader to look deeply into these and myriad other examples, to wrestle with the dilemmas confronted in history, and to identify these dilemmas within themselves. For it is inside each of us that the challenge of leadership must first find resolution.

In many ways the individual struggle of young people is reflected in the collective struggle of our young civilisation. Just as they need to cultivate their strengths and wrestle with their shadow sides so too does broader humanity, if it is to avoid the self-inflicted decline of all civilisations past. The only tool we have in this journey is our ability to learn, although it is frighteningly little used. We must find ways to learn the lessons of generations past and present: the history of scholars and the history continually unfolding around us. Similarly we must seek out the lessons of our own leadership as we progress, so that as our youth fades, the light that guides our way only brightens, the call of a world to be changed rings only clearer, and our work in the world falls into only greater harmony with our sense of purpose.

Youth leaders face difficult individual challenges with real world ramifications. These challenges are no lighter for youth than those faced by mature leaders. However, if one masters them in their early years then they may well number among the few who escape the pitfalls of the latter. The global problematic of our time demands no less.

- Originally submitted to “Initiate the Future“, July 10th 2010.

“Let me tell you about the first meeting. We sit down at the St. Regis in New York, which was sort of Dalí’s stomping ground, and eight unisexual nymphs wearing chiffon and glittery eye makeup walk in. Then Gala, his wife, in a full tuxedo- top hat, gloves, spats, cane, everything. Then Dali comes in and he’s got Aladdin shoes, purple socks that Elvis gave him, blue velvet pants, and a giraffe-skin coat, and goes, “The Dalí… is here.”

Full article in Spin Magazine, February, 2009.

Both Bruce Lee and Jeff Buckley died suddenly in there early thirties just as they were completing the work that would have seen their mastery revered in their own lifetimes around the world. Posthumously, the creations and abilities of both men have inspired massive audiences who can only grasp at the reverberations they left behind- their magnificent ripples in the pond of human creation.

I am especially sorry we did not get to see a later date Bruce Lee (1940-1973). I fancy that were he alive today we would not be calling him Bruce Lee, nor would his fame be centred on the films of his “younger years”, rather Master Lee would be renown as bringing martial arts and eastern philosophy to a renaissance unknown in our modernity. I imagine he would have taken a form somewhat like Morihei Ueshiba, the sage-like father of Aikido, acknowledge as the finest martial artist in history- a living embodiment of somatic harmony. Bruce’s unrealised later years would have been a blossoming of his philosophical side, as his study of formless form (Jeet Kune Do) expanded mental heights upon the rarest of physical perfection.

“I have not invented a “new style,” composite, modified or otherwise that is set within distinct form as apart from “this” method or “that” method. On the contrary, I hope to free my followers from clinging to styles, patterns, or molds. Remember that Jeet Kune Do is merely a name used, a mirror in which to see “ourselves”. . . Again let me remind you Jeet Kune Do is just a name used, a boat to get one across, and once across it is to be discarded and not to be carried on one’s back.”
-Bruce Lee

The “Lost Interview“. An unedited 25 minute interview with Bruce Lee on the Pierre Berton Show. Recorded on 9th December 1971 in Hong Kong. Google Video.

With Jeff it’s harder to gauge how his future would have unfolded. Too quickly we think that rockstars don’t age well- and hold secret solace that Hendrix did not go gentle into that good night. But Jeff was far more than a rockstar. He was a composer, a guitar virtuoso, a three-octave voice of serenity. An eclectic and multi talented musician from whom it is impossible to guess what forms, what layers of harmonies and pure streams of emotion would have manifested if he had lived past thirty-one.

I will always recall a piece on his album “Live at the Sine”. During a folk-rock set someone in the audience calls out the name “Nusrat”. Jeff replies by performing a spontaneous version of the Urdu Qawwali “Yeh Jo Halka Halka Saroor Hai”- stating that it’s original singer, Pakistani Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, “He’s my Elvis”.

A beautiful BBC Documentary on Jeff Buckley. Google Video.

From their art and their practice it is clear that Jeff and Bruce both had a deep spiritual awareness. An awareness which emerges as the mastery of the one- the one discipline or field- slowly becomes the mastery of the many. At this level it seems the differences in paths fall away, and the common summit of human potential is laid bare. If only they were spared the years to speak to us from these lofty heights and teach the lessons open to so few in human history- how the way can become our way.

旅に病で
夢は枯野を
かけ廻る

Sick on a journey,
my dreams wander
the withered fields.

-Basho’s last poem

Not that I’m saying you’d be any happier where I grew up in Manchester, where two of my three uncles have been fired at with Uzis…”

“What,” Ricard interrupts, “is an Uzi?”

“It’s a machine gun.”

“Ah.” The monk pauses. “I understand what you’re saying. I believe that, if I had to live where you live, I could. By choice, I would not move there. But if you allow exterior circumstances to determine your state of mind, then of course you will suffer; you become like a sponge, or like a chameleon. I have lived in difficult areas. I lived in Old Delhi for almost a year. That really is a miserable place. And yet sometimes I felt so light there. It was like – how can I put this – different weather.”

Robert Chalmers interviews Matthieu Ricard- a Buddhist monk, confidant of the Dalai Lama and neurologically speaking, a most remarkable man.
Full article in The Independent online edition

In 1922, shortly before publication of “The Prophet”, the great humanist poet Kahlil Gibran started to complain of the illness that would deteriorate until his early death nine years later. In his letters from the time we read,

“But my greatest pain is not physical. There’s something big in me. I’ve always known it and I can’t get it out. It’s a silent greater self, sitting watching a smaller somebody in me do all sorts of things.”

What strikes me about Gibran is his ability to express the deeply spiritual element of the Human, without religion or philosophy. Many other traditions, notably the Hindu sages, have delved deeply into these concepts. They name this greater Self the Atman, and this smaller somebody the Maya, or source of illusion. Perhaps looking at Gibran they would say that he knew only moments of this greater self, and that his end found him before be found his end. But I feel this is only a half-truth. Gibran was a sage of the seasons and knew their rise and fall within him. He played a game, that these bearded ones seem to shy from, and was duly elated and crushed by it. And how else could it be?

Depending on the moment, I am certain that there are many roads or one. For some time I have considered the benefits of this path or that, critiqued this choice or that. But I realised once again that I am well upon my way and a good many more footfalls is what is needed if I wish to see these mountains that loom so large upon the horizon of my mind.

Like Socrates I see sophistry everywhere; purveyors of packaged truths aimed at our recurring desire for the absolute- that impossible ecstasy of the answer. Yet I too see wisdom flowing abundant in the Great and the Human. In leading physicists and philosophers alike I see a depth of truer understanding, a knowledge which cannot be easily known, lest communicated, lest taught. Would it be folly to tease it out and make it one’s work? And perhaps, as for Gibran, how else could it be?

Travel well my friends and may we meet at many crossroads in the coming year.
Peace.

Bill Hicks, December 16, 1961 – February 26, 1994.

Perhaps Bush’s Press Secretary would like to add one more difference to the list- Mr Bush spends his free time clearing scrub in Texas- whereas Haggard flies to Denver for amphetamine heightened sex trysts with male escorts. Link

In 2004, the NAE that Haggard led reaffirmed, that “Homosexual activity, like adulterous relationships, is clearly con­demned in the Scriptures.”

As Kahlil Gibran wrote-

“But what of those to whom life is not an ocean, and man-made laws are not sand-towers,

But to whom life is a rock, and the law a chisel with which they would carve it in their own likeness?

What of the cripple who hates dancers?

What of the ox who loves his yoke and deems the elk and deer of the forest stray and vagrant things?

What of the old serpent who cannot shed his skin, and calls all others naked and shameless?

And of him who comes early to the wedding-feast, and when over-fed and tired goes his way saying that all feasts are violation and all feasters law-breakers?

What shall I say of these save that they too stand in the sunlight, but with their backs to the sun?

They see only their shadows, and their shadows are their laws.”

And thus Walter Herzog ushers my blog into a seasonable start for 2006. Herzog himself walked on foot from Munich to Paris to visit an ailing friend, critic Lotte Eisner. Furthermore, he once ate his own shoe after losing a bet to fellow filmmaker Errol Morris. Morris was interested in making a film about a pet cemetery (Gates of Heaven) and Werner believed Morris was not ambitious enough to make the film. This story was the subject of a documentary by Les Blank called Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe.

Below are stills from his 1992 film Lessons of Darkness, which comprises destructively beautiful footage of the Kuwaiti oil feels after the first Gulf War.

Possibly the best subtitle given an English text and for a book so good that Joseph Heller, author of “Catch 22″, endorsed it as a damn fine absurdist/humanist war story. The Banned Book Project says it was “Banned by almost everyone at some point since its publication. Burned in Drake, N. Dak. (1973). Banned in Rochester Mich. because the novel “contains and makes references to religious matters” and thus fell within the ban of the establishment clause. Challenged at the Owensboro, Ky. high School library (1985) because of “foul language, a reference to ‘Magic Fingers’ attached to the protagonist’s bed to help him sleep, and the sentence: ‘The gun made a ripping sound like the opening of the fly of God Almighty.’ ” Challenged, but retained on the Round Rock, Tex. Independent High School reading list (1996) after a challenge that the book was too violent.”

It’s beautiful and illustrative and absurd and too real and is told to the reader like some confidante, drunken uncle who knows you understand his kind of crazy. I shall not parade samples of his genius and ruin the meal – if you like wonderful things, and you do, read this book. But I digress. Whilst reading this felicitous copy I switched to a cultural landmark of our times, John Stewart’s “Daily Show”, and surprisingly John was interviewing this same Vonnegut, now at age 82. He looked like the confidante uncle would at his age and luckily for us his kind of crazy still had the ring of laughter, truth and vinegar to it. So synergies and salutes to this great man, who by the by falls in league with both Albert Einstein and Bertrand Russell as World Federalists- ie those who advocate a democratic federal world government. Please tell these fathers of modern physics and western philosophy that they were not “in touch with reality”.

“Here we are, trapped in the amber of the moment. There is no why”. – Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse 5

* Jeffrey Scott Buckley (November 17, 1966 – May 29, 1997) was an American singer and guitarist whose unique voice, spanning four octaves, launched him to semi-celebrity.