The year was 1848 in Europe. And it all started in France. The Revolution, also known as the Spring of Nations or People’s Spring, was a wave of chaos that swept across Europe.

It was sparked by a combination of factors, including economic hardship, social inequality, and demands for political reform and national unity.

France, in February 1848, King Louis Philippe’s government was overthrown, and a republic was declared. It spread to other European countries, including Germany, Austria, Hungary, Italy, and others, with protesters demanding constitutional reforms, civil liberties, and national independence.

These revolutions were eventually suppressed, and monarchies were restored in several countries.

But it marked a turning point in European history, contributing to the development of modern nation-states, the rise of liberalism and nationalism. It led to reforms, including the expansion of voting rights, improvements in working conditions, and increased social welfare provisions.

But historians have attributed this phase of European history to a phenomena called ” elite overproduction “.

Peter Turchin describes “Elite overproduction” as occurring when society produces too many people who feel entitled to high status and incomes relative to that country’s capacity to fully absorb elite aspirants into the power structure.

A growing number of elites feel frustrated and grow bitter towards the prevailing order and form alliances with genuinely marginalised groups in order to overthrow existing elites and install themselves in their stead. Typically, the existing elites co-opt some alienated elites to break the uprising.

European, when faced with this phenomenon, among other things, it triggered colonialism in Africa as nations saw an opportunity to “exile” these unhappy elites to form new colonies and explore new opportunities overseas.

Elite overproduction, as a situation of an excessive number of individuals with high levels of education and aspirations, results in a surplus of potential leaders and a shortage of opportunities. Increased access to higher education leads to a growing number of educated individuals, creating a surplus of potential elites. Changes in population demographics, such as a growing youth population, can lead to this situation.

Kenya has signs of this phenomenon. About 18 years ago, there were about seven. Now Kenya has about 40 public universities and 30 private ones. Add the number of Kenyans seeking higher education abroad and you have an increased number of highly skilled university graduates.

In the meantime, factories that ought to absorb these graduates have not grown at the same ratio. Public sector employment has not grown at a similar ratio. Employment trends for graduate opportunities are being threatened by advancing technology. Journalism and lawyering face Artificial Intelligence, for instance.

Whenever an advertisement for employment is published, say by a county government for graduate opportunities, it is oversubscribed by a ratio of 1: 1000.

This can only create ” counter elites” – clever but frustrated educated youngsters.

What is the cure for this? Kenya needs to make its labour market flexible. Kenya has very strict labour market regulations. An inflexible labour market makes a society unable to adjust to changes in an economy. This causes “cossetted insiders, unhappy outsiders”. Those inside are pampered and privileged. Those outside gnaw in the misery of unemployment.

An inflexible labour market also causes misallocation of labour. That explains why you find engineers in the banking sector and accountants driving vehicles- skills mismatch.

Labour market reforms are important in making Kenya’s economy agile.

One practical proposal should be to expand the graduate internship programme both in the public and private sectors. This requires policies enacted at the national level on human resources and cascaded to counties.