ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the decade which began so positively and ended so emptily for the youth sector. It analyses the socio-economic profile as well as value base of young people at the close of the decade, and offers some observations regarding youth alienation. As South Africa moved from confrontation to negotiation, so public opinion became more sympathetic to the young people behind the well- known images. The lost generation returned, in media stories and everyday speech. And in the gung-ho capitalist rhetoric of the new South Africa, youth have to either put up or shut up. Periodising the youth development movement in the 1990s may provide a clearer understanding of how the current situation was reached, the political dynamics at play, and the opportunities missed. The youth sector as a whole was at its peak in the early years of the decade. This was true of political organisations and the far broader array of structures concerned with youth development.
