NCJ Number
208139
Journal
Youth & Society Volume: 36 Issue: 2 Dated: December 2004 Pages: 131-142
Date Published
December 2004
Length
12 pages
Annotation
This introductory preview of articles in this special issue of "Youth & Society" focuses on the continuing influence on youths' development of inequalities in social class, as this factor impacts youths' experiences of school, communal conditioning, and the search for work.
Abstract
After a postwar period in which the prospects of social mobility for the working class expanded in many Western capitalist societies, education is now apparently entrenching patterns of social and economic privilege based on class and, to a significant degree, on race and ethnicity. The upper and middle classes are typically able to manipulate the education system so as to reproduce their advantage in the next generation. As Western economies are transformed to feature jobs in service-sector activities, and as jobs become increasingly temporary and less career-based, class inequalities and life chances may be even more limited than when youth had opportunities to enter manufacturing jobs. Critical studies of youth and the risk for deviant behavior point to how uncertainties in transitions into adulthood may be changing according to social class. Extended periods of formal education for upper class youth lead to delays in moving out of dependence on the family and in the forming of long-term, stable relationships. For youth in lower social classes, the rapid transition to wage-earning status may be necessary for family economic security. These transitional processes are further influenced by gender. The papers in this special issue examine the various factors within differing socioeconomic domains that influence transitions from adolescence to adulthood and carry distinctive criminogenic risks. 41 references