Being young in the Guinée Forestière: members of youth associations as political entrepreneurs

This paper is a contribution to a better understanding on what it means to be young and to grow up amidst political transformation processes in Guinea in the 2000s. It focuses on students and graduates in Guéckédou, a border town in the Guinée Forestière. How do these youths gain a living and participate in a complex and turbulent socio-political landscape? The qualitative research showed that they followed various economic activities in parallel; amongst others they were busy with so-called youth associations, the main focus of this paper. I argue that these youth associations can be described as self-created arenas for both economic and political participation. Thus, the members represent “political entrepreneurs” as their practices have to be situated in-between money-making, investment and political involvement. Interestingly, they thereby collaborate with various actors and institutions, including local elders, the state administration or local political parties and NGOs.