Lebanon must win back its disillusioned young generation

Hardly anyone alive today remembers the roaring ‘20s, the post-First World War cultural revival; the jazz age that rejected the values, ideas and institutions of a previous generation that had led Europe to self-destruction. Lebanon may today be going through something similar, with traumatized postwar youths reacting to what they see as a society and a state that has failed them in every possible way. This piece is inspired by an intense but fascinating evening I spent with a group of young people from a certain political party who are engaged in the process of rethinking the country.