Young people and the future of Portugal
The way a nation views the training of youth largely determines its future as a country. In addition to the demographic winter that we are going through, we are facing dynamics of reconfiguration of the instruments and institutions that shape the formation of youth, and that it is urgent to understand and pilot, so that they do not become factors of decline of the foundations of our society, leading to the progressive country extension.
The formation of youth, carried out in the context of families, society, schools and many other institutions, is done not only in classes and through study, but above all through concrete experiences of values, ethical principles and solidarity, rooting cultural, which shape the character and involve a young person in an adult.
It is in this context that one must understand the voice of sports activities, theater, music, history, literature, club, scout, parish and social solidarity activities for the civic formation of each young person.
The example of the struggle of the Ukrainian people for the right to be an independent nation leads us to ask to what extent, we Portuguese, and in particular the younger ones, minister, understand what is going on, and what leads those people to fight until the death. When the easiest thing was to let go of the wave and submit to the law of the strongest!
The nation is either within each one of us, or it doesn’t exist! National citizenship is not against anyone, but it affirms itself positively, for the values of its culture, for the qualities of its people, for the way in which it understands that it wants to be governed.
Our education system has to assume a key role in the citizenship education of young Portuguese people.
And this goes far beyond the subject of Citizenship.
It is through the way in which the school provides practical experiences, reinforces behaviors and inhibits degrading deviations, in partnership with parents, local authorities and other institutions where young people live their daily lives, that young people are formed and that the nation of the future it happens.
*Distinguished professor emeritus at IST and founder and researcher emeritus at INESC