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'I don't want any arguments later as to whether I said this or that. The form, please, officer-I'm literate, you know.' She glared back at him.
'How old are you?' he asked. 'Aren't you a TSP?' He was trying to figure out how a girl her age had the guts to question a man wearing a police uniform-he was used to dealing efficiently with obedient villagers, regardless of their age.
'What relevance is my age?'
In Onalenna Doo Selolwane's article entitled "The Future of Democracy in Botswana: The Role of Youth," the author analyzes preliminary data on the political participation of youth in the development of Botswana as a democratic country. One of the significant journeys for Botswana she states is its search for the meaning of democracy "within and outside" Botswana. Citizens of Botswana have been on quest for self-discovery and identity as much as they have wanted to contribute to world knowledge. As part of this journey for Botswana, Selolwane maintains not only have political parties begun to tally the position of youth as potential voters and as an interest group that can be harnessed to strengthen parties and ensure survival, but also the youth have been exercising their electoral will and have made important demands on political parties to free up space for more transparency and accountability. Her argument rests on the idea that youth have the potential to change existing political institutions as they seek to gain legitimate power and participate in governing their country.
The cultural phenomenon of empowered youth, if Selolwane's research data is to be granted serious consideration, can be a contentious and threatening idea for a nation. Just how contentious and threatening it can be is part of what Deborah Durham deals with in "Disappearing youth: Youth as Social Shifter in Botswana." For her, the term youth is highly complex, because it positions an individual and/or group with respect to a range of social attributes, which include age, independence-dependence, authority, rights, abilities, knowledge, and responsibilities. Thus, according to Durham, determining who the youth are in Botswana involves crucial issues of power, agency, and moral structures of society. As she elaborates, "I mean that arguing over youth, or maturity, involves exploring what it means to be a person,...