Transitions to adulthood in contexts of economic crisis and post-recession. The case of Argentina

The possibilities that are available to youth in contemporary Western societies are highly sophisticated and related mostly to the transition between secondary school and higher education, the first job placement, independent housing, lifestyle construction and the consumption of goods produced by cultural industries in a globalist world. Secondary education represents a main factor in terms of socialisation, training, access to employment, citizenship and youth identity construction, making it a key for public policies aimed at youth in Latin America. The article presents the initial results of a research project on transition processes from secondary school to employment in Argentina. The findings are based on statistical information and the empirical analysis of data gathered in two very different economic and social contexts: the first was one of the worst social and economic crisis in the country's history (1999–2003), and the second was a long period of economic growth and increased social welfare (2004–2012). The data are presented in response to the following question: How do different economic contexts influence the transitions of youth in different social class contexts? By answering this question, the significant role of public policies in generating better living conditions for youth becomes clear.     

Exploring the development of meaningful work for children and youth in Western contexts

Through a literature review, this paper explores current issues influencing the transition to meaningful adult work for youth living in Western contexts. Historical and contemporary perspectives of children's work are discussed. With the current emphasis on finding meaningful work, youth face greater challenges because the transition to adult work is more complex, offering additional options without structured pathways. Today's youth are required to invest more energy into developing the skills and self-knowledge needed to make meaningful decisions about future work. Given this challenge, a number of key factors associated with the successful transition to adult work are identified and discussed including social origin, time orientation, parental influence, work experience, and participation in structured leisure pursuits. For each key factor, implications for practice are offered to help parents, teachers, youth workers, and other significant adults foster interactions and experiences that may assist today's youth in successfully transitioning to meaningful adult work.     

Work and Family in the 21st Century: Four Research Domains

During the last half of the 20th century, married women with children moved into the labor force in large numbers. This change, which occurred throughout the industrialized world, dramatically altered work, family, and gender roles. Working parents today juggle demanding jobs and busy family lives and find it increasingly difficult to balance these activities. Work‐family conflict has become a pressing social issue. This article examines four areas of social science research on work and family, including: work‐family conflict, spillover, and multiple roles; work‐family policies in organizations; effects of work on family life; and cross–national research on work and family. Although much is known about all of these topics, more research is needed to address the work‐family challenges of the 21st century.     

For the public good: Urban youth advocacy and the fight for public education

This article examines a grassroots movement for public education that has recently emerged to challenge corporate-style education reformers. These reformers became well-established in the early 21st century promoting the business strategies of capitalism such as school choice, competition, privatization, and closure. To understand how and why local communities are fighting for public education while embracing a much older, traditional notion of the common good, this article takes Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania as a case study, situating the struggle for public education in historical and political contexts. It also places the corporate-reform and grassroots movements in a social and economic framework, and it pays special attention to the urban youth who stand at the center of much of the policy debate on public education, considering the ways in which young people themselves express political agency through activism.     

Implementing a Knowledge Management System in a School of Social Work: The Possibilities,Challenges, and Lessons Learned

Managing emerging scientific, professional, and applied practice knowledge has become increasingly more important in the 21st century because economic and social connections in organizations are becoming more complex, associated with greater global connectivity. One approach to this growing complexity and emerging need involves the development of a technology-based knowledge management (KM) system. This paper describes one human service organization's attempt to implement and capture the complex knowledge needs and requirements for a knowledge management system. The implementation described is in the third year of a five year process. The challenges when incorporating such reorganization will be addressed. This case example also illustrates the complexities, possibilities, and lessons learned while implementing a knowledge management system within a school of social work and subsequently its capacity to be transferred to human service organizations.     

Youth transitions and interdependent adult–child relations in rural Bolivia

There are few studies which document youth transitions from school to work in rural areas of the majority world. This paper, based on ethnographic fieldwork in a rural community in Bolivia, considers how young people make decisions about different types of school-to-work transitions which include migrating to continue their formal education, working in the community, or seeking migrant work in the regional town or in neighbouring Argentina. The paper explores how young people negotiate structural constraints over their choice of transition, including the rural location, economic resources, parental attitudes and family background, gender, birth order, social networks and role models. Importantly the paper highlights that underlying young people's choice of transition are interdependent household relations. In the majority world, in this case in Bolivia, rural young people may achieve economic independence sooner than those in the minority world, but long-term family interdependence tends to be maintained throughout the life-course. This paper suggests that the notion of negotiated interdependence is a more appropriate way to understand youth transitions and relations between young people and adults in rural areas of the majority world.     

Beyond Social Constructionism: A Structural Analysis of the Cultural Significance of the Child Star

This article challenges the dominance of social constructionist theories of childhood by presenting a structural analysis of the child star as a recurrent, universal feature in the myths and legends of the world. The article argues that by conceptualising our understanding of children and childhood as being due solely to the socio‐historical context in which they live, an important dimension of childhood may be overlooked. Through looking at media stories about child stars throughout the twentieth century, this article uses a psychoanalytic Jungian framework to explore deeper similarities and patterns in cultural story telling about children over different cras and social contexts.     

Sex,Drugs, Rock ‘n’ Roll…and Children

Abstract

In this article we identify some of the challenges for gay men who desire to create more intimate relationships and more stable families in the evolving and potentially more conducive socio-political environment of the 21st century in the United States. Secondly, we delineate a multi-systemic structural model of working with male couples and families that addresses the interplay of the couple's interactional system with larger religious, civil and social systems. Finally, we demonstrate systemic interventions with a case example of a male couple and their family coping with 21st century challenges.     

Youth Civic Engagement in the Twenty‐First Century

We enter the 21st century contending with the end of the Cold War's legacy of political uncertainty, expecting youth to play a significant part in the search for new principles that will bring about stability in the world political order. In forging the future, youth will have to collaborate with adults, but on terms more fitting of the historical circumstances that lie ahead than those of the past. This was the framework adopted by a group of social scientists who held several discussions to reflect on the issues and opportunities that bear on youth's civic engagement and development in the century that has just opened. The present article describes the results of those conversations, starting with the issue of defining civic competence, and the finding that an expansive definition is needed to match the real‐world circumstances that affect its development for youth internationally. Specific conditions, such as globalization, information – communication technology, and immigration, are emphasized as forces that affect youth and need to be taken into account by educators and policy makers. In this regard, responsibilities of schools, government, the commercial sector, and community organizations are outlined. Each is viewed as a potential constructive force for promoting engagement insofar as youth's strengths are recognized and focus is placed on building on youth's proven capacities. As always, it is youth’s task to make history in the future and society's obligation to provide youth with sufficient resources and an honest basis for hope in carrying out this task. The authors' policy recommendations are founded on this reciprocal relation that binds the youth generation with its elders in the common task of preserving, while transforming, society for the good of humanity.     

The Dawn is Too Distant: The Experience of 28 Social Work Graduates Entering the Social Work Field in China

Nurturing new, competent social work professionals requires multilevel preparation extending from school to the workplace. However, not much has been done to understand this school-to-work transition process in countries where the social work profession is still in an early stage of development. This paper reports the findings of an exploratory qualitative study of 28 new social workers in China, where social work is an emerging profession, on how they entered the field and what challenges they encountered. Their stories indicate that what they learned in school did form a foundation for the establishment of their professional identity in the workplace. However, due to workplace politics and to the lack of recognition of their professional status, they experienced an unsettling induction process. Coupled with the challenges of inadequate financial compensation, the careers of these new social workers may face an early end despite the great future for the profession promised by the government. Implications of this study for social work education in China are also discussed.     

Vital tasks and roles of frontline workers facilitating job inclusion of vulnerable youth

Researchers and others are worried about the marginalization of vulnerable youth who drop out of school and work. Frontline workers are key support givers for vulnerable youth, but they have been described as professionals who lack a recognized body of knowledge they can rely on. This article investigates vital frontline roles and tasks related to job inclusion of vulnerable youth. Qualitative data are drawn from 16 Norwegian pilot projects aimed at developing social work approaches among vulnerable youth. The challenges and the support provided resemble those in other European countries. Cross-case analysis suggests four main support roles: (1) administration and securing of basic needs, (2) connection and relationship building, (3) job enabling, and (4) job customisation. Combining roles 1 and 2 with roles 3 or 4 seems to improve the outcomes, meaning that they improve the capabilities of vulnerable youth to find and master a job when that is something they have reason to value. Since this topic has been little explored for vulnerable youth, this article contributes to further developing job inclusion support for this target group in particular.     

Accentuation of Individual Differences in Social Competence During the Transition to Adolescence

Using a sample of individuals (277 males, 315 females) studied since birth in the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development, the present study investigated how early pubertal maturation and school transition alter youth trajectories of social competence during the transition to adolescence. Social competence showed strong continuity, with the most socially competent children remaining so in adolescence. Early pubertal maturation and school transitions accentuate individual differences, increasing social competence among more competent youth, but further diminishing social competence among less competent individuals. In essence, facing challenges that require social competence may further separate competent individuals from less competent peers. Thus, the psychosocially rich become richer, while the psychosocially poor become poorer.     

世界城市内涵的历史演变及对北京的启示

随着时代的变迁,经济社会的发展,世界城市的概念和评价标准有所变化。早期世界城市是指世界的政治、商业和文化中心。20世纪60年代以后,随着跨国公司的崛起和新国际劳动分工的确立,世界城市是指跨国公司总部聚集地和全球金融中心。21世纪之后,随着文化经济的崛起和人们对消费在城市经济中的重要性的再认识,世界城市有了新的内涵,正在从单纯的经济中心,转变为集聚科技、文化、娱乐、教育和医疗等多种高端才人的中心。北京建设世界城市不仅仅是发展金融业和总部经济,而是要从多方面入手,建设富有活力、利于创新、适宜居住的现代化国际都市。     

The Jack Wills crowd: towards a sociology of an elite subculture

British sociologists have long been interested in youth sub‐cultures. However British sociologists have tended to focus on working class subcultures and avoided engagement with exclusive sub‐cultures of elite social groups. This article seeks to attend to this gap by examining the subculture of a British elite: ex‐public school students at select universities in the UK in the twenty‐first century. This group consists of a relatively small group of young adults, aged between 18 and 23, who attended public schools, especially one of the nine Clarendon schools (Eton, Winchester, Westminster, St. Paul's, Merchant Taylor's, Shrewsbury, Rugby, Harrow and Charterhouse), and were students at a selective group of British universities, primarily Oxford and Cambridge, Durham, Bristol, Exeter, Bath, Manchester, St Andrews and Edinburgh. The article examines the way in which this group has reconfigured and re‐constituted itself in the face of globalizing challenges. Specifically, it examines the way in which participation of ex‐public school students in events run by and under the patronage of the high street retailing company, Jack Wills, has played a galvanising role for this group in the last decade. The Jack Wills crowd is an example of how some young adults form exclusive social networks and reproduce prevailing forms of privilege. The social networks built around the Jack Wills subculture is likely to provide them with advantages in the job market through a prodigious network of connections and patrons. The Jack Wills subculture potentially contributions to the socio‐economic reproduction of the higher professional middle classes.     

Globalization,Societal Change,and New Technologies: What They Mean for the Future of Adolescence

Nations around the world are undergoing rapid changes that are altering the nature of adolescence in their societies. This volume examines current trends in adolescent experience across nations, with the objective of identifying emerging problems and opportunities in adolescents' preparation for adulthood. This introduction reviews methods used by futurists and how these methods are applicable to adolescence, and provides an overview of some of the macrochanges that are shaping the societies in which adolescents of the future will live. The macrochanges considered include demographic trends, globalization, trends in government, and changes in technology. Subsequent articles in this volume examine how these and other changes are altering adolescents' transition to adult work, preparation for adult interpersonal lives, civic and community engagement, and health and well‐being. The final article focuses on social policy and is followed by a conclusion with the main points and trends in the volume.     

Preparing social workers for global gaze: locating global citizenship within social work curricula

Institutions of higher education have been particularly vulnerable to the pressures of globalization, resulting in policies and ensuing curricula that look to address the needs of students to be better prepared for living and working in a world in which global awareness, and perhaps even global identity, are requisites for success. Social work education is uniquely positioned to adapt its curricula for successful student outcomes in an increasingly globalized world. The challenges associated with social welfare, which have intensified under globalization, has been a long-standing concern of social work policy and practice. This article suggests strategies for integrating global citizenship education within social work studies, recognizing the affinities that exist between contemporary conceptualizations of global citizenship and social work practice. The article proposes four interrelated components that might be strategically implemented within existing social work curriculum, in consideration of the contextual ethos of the respective school of social work.     

The Political Economy of Longevity: Developing New Forms of Solidarity for Later Life

Aging populations now exert influence on all aspects of social life. This article examines changes to major social and economic institutions linked with old age, taking the period from the mid‐20th century to the opening decades of the 21st century. These developments are set within the context of the influence of globalization as well as the impact of the 2008 financial crisis, these restructuring debates around the longevity revolution. The article examines how the basis for a new framework for accommodating longevity can be built, outlining ways of securing new forms of solidarity in later life.     

Embracing the Village and Tribe: Critical Thinking for Social Workers From an African-Centered Approach

The social work department at a small historically Black college implemented an African-centered approach to the course Critical Thinking for Social Workers for freshmen students who declared social work as their major. We firmly believe that knowing and understanding the history and legacy of people of African descent is extremely important in educating African American students. Various pedagogical techniques, assignments, and intentional lecture topics were used in the implementation of this unique teaching style. This article reports the findings from using the African-centered approach in pedagogy and offers implications for social work education in the 21st century for historically Black colleges and universities and other programs with minority student populations.     

Empowering Community-Based Programs for Youth Development

This article discusses the need for community-based programs for youth and their families and urges the social work profession to resume its historical leadership in such programs while incorporating recent theory and practice. The authors describe the reasons why social workers abandoned neighborhood-based youth development services, the intended outcomes of such services, and current societal and professional trends that support a revival of social work’s involvement in youth development. They discuss one school of social work’s current participation in a youth agency partnership and examine implications of the suggested revival for social work education. Collaboration among families, schools, diverse community services, agencies, and educators is emphasized.     

An Analysis of Leadership Within the Social Work Profession

This article presents the results of a study investigating how individuals currently in leadership positions within the Council on Social Work Education and the National Association of Social Workers perceive social work leadership. A random sample of 75 deans and directors and 75 executive directors and presidents were selected to participate in a telephone survey employing an eight-item, open-ended questionnaire. The findings define leadership within the social work profession and describe social work leadership as different from other professions. The participants identified essential skills for social work leaders and articulated a mission for social work leadership in the 21st century.