‘Waiting to be called’: rural youth, hope and future-making in South Sulawesi, Indonesia

Amidst increasing livelihood precarity, many of Indonesia’s rural
youth continue to hope for a better future. This article examines
five life stories of young people living through insecure livelihood
opportunities and uneven processes of agrarian change in the
Maros Regency of South Sulawesi, Indonesia. While previous
research describes the livelihood constraints facing rural youth in
Indonesia, fewer studies centre hope in their analyses of how
young people rework uneven trajectories of change. We discuss
how hope is embodied in the varied ways youth face,
renegotiate, and plan their futures in rural places. Young people
participate in a process of ‘future-making’ as they move between
and draw on different ‘modes of hope’ (including patient,
estimative and resolute) at different times and life stages. Rural
youth hope for a better future and actively embark on activities –
from migration, education and local entrepreneurialism – to
realise these futures. Yet, we also find that feelings of
hopefulness are shaped and constrained by underlying class and
gender dimensions (including prospects for land ownership), as
well as societal expectations. The study foregrounds the
importance of young people’s hopes and subjective emotions in
shaping the pursuit of livelihood trajectories and processes of
‘future-making’ in rural spaces.