There is a growing conversation among Rwandans--on social media, in homes and at family gatherings--about what many perceive as the rapid erosion of Rwandan culture, discipline and traditional values. Older generations worry that young people are becoming increasingly individualistic, impatient, materialistic, and detached from the values that once held families and communities together.
A popular saying captures this concern: "Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times." Commonly attributed to G. Michael Hopf's 2016 novel Those Who Remain, it is not an established sociological law, but it offers a useful lens through which to examine how adversity, prosperity and changing generations can affect societies.
The idea also echoes Ibn Khaldun's concept of asabiyyah, or social cohesion, and the later generational theories of William Strauss and Neil Howe. Rwanda's modern history provides an especially interesting case.
The period from 1959 to 1994 was marked by political upheaval, exclusion, violence, displacement, refugeehood, war and ultimately the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. For many Rwandans, survival demanded hard work, discipline, family solidarity and mutual assistance. These were not merely desirable virtues; they were necessities.
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After 1994, the generation shaped by those difficult experiences redirected its resilience toward rebuilding Rwanda. Initiatives such as Umuganda, Imihigo and Itorero institutionalised aspects of collective responsibility, civic participation and national purpose.
Rwanda subsequently experienced significant economic and institutional transformation, improved infrastructure and public services, and gained a reputation for security, cleanliness and effective administration.
But success created a new challenge.
Young Rwandans today are growing up in circumstances fundamentally different from those experienced by their parents and grandparents. For most, survival is no longer the overriding concern. That is a tremendous achievement, but it also means that some values forged by hardship may no longer come naturally.
Globalisation, urbanisation, social media and digital technology have introduced new lifestyles and aspirations. Individual expression, consumption and immediate gratification increasingly compete with communal responsibility, patience, sacrifice and delayed gratification.
Yet we should be careful not to label every cultural change as moral decline. Today's young Rwandans can demonstrate resilience through entrepreneurship, technology, science, creative industries and global competition--opportunities largely unavailable to previous generations.
The challenge is therefore not to recreate the suffering of the past, but to preserve the virtues that hardship taught us without reproducing the hardship itself.
Lessons from Singapore, South Korea
Rwanda is not alone in confronting this generational transition. Singapore and South Korea also moved from poverty, insecurity and national vulnerability to prosperity and global competitiveness.
Singapore uses national service, national education and Total Defence to remind citizens that prosperity cannot be taken for granted. South Korea maintains compulsory military service and a demanding educational culture, while its development was also shaped by the Saemaul Undong, which emphasised diligence, self-help and community development.
Their experience, however, offers another lesson: discipline must evolve with the economy. Young people in a digital economy cannot simply be expected to reproduce the lives of farmers, factory workers or soldiers of previous generations. Their arena is the university, laboratory, technology company, business and creative industry.
The objective should be to transfer the character of the old generation into the skills and opportunities of the new one.
But there is a warning. Excessive educational and social pressure can produce burnout, stress and serious demographic consequences. Rwanda should therefore not attempt to create strong citizens by creating unnecessarily harsh conditions. The objective should be resilience, not suffering.
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This brings us to an important question: What should government do?
It would be a mistake to suggest that Rwanda must choose between human rights and social discipline. A stable society needs both. Rights protect individual dignity, but rights do not eliminate responsibility. Freedom does not mean freedom from consequences, and modernisation does not require abandoning cultural identity.
At the same time, preservation of national values must not become a justification for arbitrary restrictions or unnecessary intrusion into private life. The better approach is to build institutions that cultivate responsible freedom and this is where educational institutions remain paramount.
The writer is a journalist.
