Introduction

The contributions to this volume repeatedly demonstrate that there is a need for a unified perspective on the structural causes, psychosocial consequences, and political solutions of long-term joblessness during the transition from youth to adulthood. My commentary, therefore, begins with the economic and social structures producing youth unemployment, its distribution, and its ups and downs in various countries. A theoretical interlude follows concerning the convertibility of family social capital into employment prospects and career resources for young people by putting the debate between Coleman and Modell in a wider theoretical framework of cultural reproduction. Finally, concepts of individual and social mechanisms assumed to be related to youth unemployment are reviewed to develop realistic proposals for intervention and prevention.

Economy, Education, and the Labor Market as Structural Contexts

As Michael White and David Smith demonstrate in their comparative analysis of the high unemployment rates in industrial nations in the 1980s, a focus on individual factors will only identify those persons who are selected for unemployment. To better understand the persistence of joblessness among the young population we have to instead look at economic structures and labor-market policies. There are severe problems for comparative analysis, though, even if one relies on the OECD or ILO statistics, because the formal definitions of unemployment differ among nations and economic periods. For example, in the United States someone who is counted as “unemployed” is supposed to have no job and to have been actively looking for work for the past month; in Germany the status of unemployment is not restricted to an active period of job search but depends on being registered as looking for employment at the local labor exchange.