Paper short abstract:

As many rural youth in are navigating between chosen or given (im)mobilities their perception of the state differs than that of the elders. Youth do not imagine themselves as passive receivers, but rather as active shapers of their own future and of development in their community and state.

Paper long abstract:

Most of the people in rural Eastern Nepal are waiting for the state to improve their lives. The state gave schools, but not jobs, built the road and told people to construct proper toilets. State is usually equalised with development and it is always in debt in front of people. It often fails. Local jobs and local income are never perceived seriously, because they are unstable and they do not come from the state. To cope there are two solutions pursued through youngsters: 1) sending them to study, which would hopefully give them governmental jobs and reconnection with the state or 2) sending them abroad to work and to make a livelihood's socio-economics easier.

In this way young people unavoidably happen to be in different "spatial and social geographies" (Mahler and Pessar 2001) - in or out the village, by fact or expectation or imagination. Geography matters a lot because according to mobility pursued a young person also takes a certain social position.

However, young people are not willing to follow the path of coping with the state failure. Negotiation and experience of (im)mobility of oneself or others enhances cognitive processes and, particularly, responsibility. Young people realize possibilities for access to power that they can use for improvement of their own or others life; but above all for developing their village or even Nepal, that actually needs them in this critical situation. They are not passive receivers any more: They are active builders and improvers of the state.