Young Asians have supported the Occupy Wall Street phenomenon by occupying their own cities in the past month. Whether or not one supports these Occupy movements, what's unmistakable is the fact that it is not just the bottom rungs of our society who are dissatisfied with the status quo. It is also those who are in their prime years, having received decent education and grown up as Asia's tiger economies were taking off. They are the 'tiger cubs' - young people who grew up in Asia's fast- growing economies with protective parents who use their newfound affluence to ensure that their children make the most of opportunities that the elder generation never had.
Three decades ago, Asia was poor, far behind the West. Today it is being hailed by Western media as a continent of promise and possibility.
The parents of today's young Asians knew hunger and revolution. Now, their children are better-fed and better-educated, and have access to the world through the internet in a way that would have been unthinkable at the time they were born. Thanks to heavy investments in education, more of them can go to school and, once there, study for more years than their parents. They can aspire to jobs in areas of biotech, engineering, information technology and finance that did not exist a generation ago.
However, from these tiger cubs' perspective, Asia faces unprecedented challenges. Despite the rosy picture of Asia's economic growth, many young Asians are uncertain that they will have better lives than their parents.
Based on almost 400 essays submitted to the Asia's Challenge 2020 contest, designed to look at the biggest challenges facing the region in the next decade, the tiger cubs as a group are both hopeless and hopeful. They are worried about a myriad of problems that Asia is facing, yet are hopeful about Asia's rise.
A recurring theme is that human capital development is of utmost importance. The tiger cubs are troubled by the unequal access to education, particularly for poor rural children and for girls. They lament that the majority of schools do not sufficiently teach communication and creativity. Unemployment, or underemployment, of educated young Asians appears to be the new reality.
Echoing the sentiments of many Occupy protesters, the tiger cubs are worried about widening income disparities and the lack of economic mobility. The sense that hard work does not lead to a better life because of an unequal playing field increasingly breeds resentment towards the rich. They are concerned about the abject poor who are vulnerable to everything from natural disasters to global economic meltdowns, and for whom the question is not improving life so much as sustaining it.
