Participatory Governance through Youth Volunteerism in Public Sector of Pakistan

Abstract

Participatory governance in public sector is of great importance especially for a democratic country like Pakistan. In this paper we discuss Youth Volunteerism as tool to ensure participation of young people in public service delivery as partners of the government. This research is based on primary data collected on convenience sampling basis, through questionnaires distributed among 243 youth studying in colleges of selected areas of Pakistan.  The objective of this research was to find out the perception of young people about Volunteerism in public sector and to find factors that may encourage them to engage in participatory governance through volunteering in public sector institutions of Pakistan. Data was analyzed through SPSS-21, using Multiple Regression Analysis and Pearson’s Correlation techniques. The results show that young people in Pakistan are willing to volunteer their services in the public sector because they think it is honor for them, it is need of the time and that it will increase the productivity of the public institutions. This study concludes that promoting culture of volunteerism in the public sector of Pakistan will enable young people to become part of government in service deliver, will reduce public-government gap, will help reduce shortage of workforce in public sector and will increase the productivity of public institutions.