"Good Life Never Comes Like Dreams": Youth and the City in Tanzania

With almost two-thirds of its population under the age of 24, young people are at the forefront of Tanzania’s development challenges – and future. Tanzania’s cities continue to attract large numbers of young people with the promises of modernity and opportunity they are perceived to bring. Yet despite these expectations, young people find themselves in hostile urban environments that leave them unable to accumulate the resources they need for achieving social and economic independence or securing a better future. The speed of urban growth has outstripped the capacity of urban economies and institutions to provide jobs, services and other basic needs and has led to widespread economic insecurity, particularly among youth. Youth unemployment in Tanzania is four times that of the national rate, and urban youth face a greater likelihood of under- and unemployment (Restless Development 2013). Such inequalities in access to opportunity also lead to intergenerational tensions, leading to predictions of a ‘crisis of youth’ as increasing numbers of urban youth find it difficult to access employment and remain unable to meet standard living aspirations. Drawing upon recent fieldwork in Arusha, this paper will explore how access to resources, opportunities and institutional support among urban youth is shaped by multiple and self-reinforcing inequalities on the basis of gender, age, and location. The findings highlight the ways in which the city has become a place of social and economic exclusion for young people, constraining opportunities for their development and social mobility. Understanding these multiple deprivations and how they shape the opportunities, obstacles and aspirations of young people highlights the importance of moving towards a more inclusive policy environment and a more integrated set of youth development programmes that take into account these realities in young peoples’ social and economic lives.