Description
Since the economic and financial crisis of 2008, the proportion of unemployed young people has exceeded any other group of unemployed adults. This phenomenon marks the emergence of a laborscape. This concept recognizes that, although youth unemployment is not consistent across the world, it is a coherent problem in the global political economy.
This book examines this crisis of youth unemployment, drawing on international case studies. It is organized around four key dimensions of the crisis: precarity, flexibility, migration, and policy responses. With contributions from leading experts in the field, the chapters offer a dynamic portrait of unemployment and how this is being challenged through new modes of resistance. This book provides cross-national comparisons, both ethnographic and quantitative, to explore the contours of this laborscape on the global, national, and local scales. Throughout these varied case studies is a common narrative from young workers, families, students, volunteers, and activists facing a new and growing problem.
This book will be an imperative resource for students and researchers looking at the sociology of globalization, global political economy, labor markets, and economic geography.
Table of Contents
1 Global Laborscapes of Youth Unemployment Introduction 2 Youth Unemployment and Unnecessary Intergenerational Conflict 3 Precarity in Japan: After the ‘Lost Decade’ 4 "I need money, that’s the only reason I do it": Youth "volunteers", unemployment, and international action in Pakistan’s health sector 5 Dealing with Joblessness. Young people’s access to life through ‘non-work’ activities in Buenos Aires, Argentina 6 Contrasting Discourses Surrounding Gendered Representations of Young Migrants Negotiating for Work on the South African Border 7 The Rise of the J-1 Summer Work Travel Program and its Rhetorical Links U.S. Youth Unemployment 8 Youth Unemployment and Emigration in the Post-Celtic Tiger Era 9 Youth Unemployment, Neoliberal Reforms and Emigration in West-Africa 10 Sitting Amid a Pile of Jewels 11 The Youth Wage Subsidy in South Africa: A controversial proposal to respond to mass youth Unemployment12 The Right to Work and the Youth Unemployment Crisis in Spain 13 Bad Schools, No Jobs, Full Jails": Mass incarceration and as monumental incentive failure
