Coping Unpredictability – Hope and Orientation of Burkinabe University Graduates in Times of Uncertainty

This research examines the self-concepts and strategies of action of university graduates in Burkina Faso, who find themselves in uncertain situations due to the vast unemployment rates. Motivated by the wish to find well-paid jobs, which will allow them to live the life they want to live and to meet the expectations of their families and of society, they pursued university studies despite the costs and the expenditure of time as well as the unfavorable study conditions. Thus, university studies involve various risks, yet still the aspirations connected to an university degree outbalance the anticipated difficulties. University graduates are hoping for a golden opportunity, be it in the private or the public sector, bearing the possibility to fulfill one’s wishes concerning the future.

Given their uncertain situation, university graduates face major difficulties in planning their life, yet they hope that their situation will change in the foreseeable future, be it by the grace of god or by the emergence of new possibilities. The hope for a possible, maybe unforeseeable change is what drives them in evolving various strategies which on the one hand might increase their chances on the labor market, but on the other hand also include certain risks.

Based on six months of empirical field research in Ouagadougou, this paper investigates how hope informs the anticipation university graduates have concerning their future life courses as well as the trust on which their navigation through omnipresent uncertainty towards an anticipated brighter future is based, and also on the various risks those strategies might contain.