Time to give youth its voice

Millions of young people have had their futures stolen by the foolishness of our political and business leaders. At a critical time for our planet, it’s time our youth let their voices be heard, writes David Puttnam.

I’VE just finished reading a brilliant book entitled The Bully Pulpit, written by an historian named Doris Kearns Goodwin. It details the development in the United States early in the 20th century of what’s known as the ‘reformist’, or ‘progressive’ movement.

This largely resulted from a convergence of ideas regarding social justice driven by the energy of the then president, Theodore Roosevelt, and the commitment of a group of campaigning journalist — working for McClure’s Magazine — foremost among whom was a woman named Ida Tarbell. This largely forgotten figure can quite justifiably be said to have invented ‘responsible investigative journalism’.