connecting youth with society

1. Youth inclusion and participation in the
activating welfare state.
Filip Coussée
UGent – Uit De Marge

2. Redistribution?
 GNP 1948: 43% goes to the top 20% of most
wealthy people, only 5% to the 20% most
poor.
 1975: 40% vs 5,6% - redistribution?
 2010: 48,1% vs 4% - redistribution!

3. Poverty and social exclusion
1. The positive functions of poverty
2. Paradox of positional goods
Inclusion is a moral crusade to safeguard
“our” social order
Social policy  projects + projects +
projects

4. Reconnecting youth to society
Social pedagogy entails a
critical reflection on the
role of pedagogical
institutions in society
referring to ‘cultural
action’ as questioning,
demythologising,
‘historicising’ and
changing dehumanising
processes by unveiling
the social, political and
cultural project
underpinning educational
institutions.

5. “We've been through a period where too
many people have been given to
understand that if they have a problem,
it's the government's job to cope with it. 'I
have a problem, I'll get a grant.' 'I'm
homeless, the government must house
me.' They're casting their problem on
society. And, you know, there is no such
thing as society. There are individual men
and women, and there are families. And
no government can do anything except
through people, and people must look to
themselves first. It's our duty to look after
ourselves and then, also to look after our
neighbour.”

6. Joined up services?
 Institutional inclusion, not
social inclusion
 Succesfull transition to
adulthood
 The preventative service
 Going full circle • Young people are targeted as
main priority
• Youth work is recognised as
important actor to contribute to
objectives

7.  Promoting their social and professional integration as an
essential component to reach the objectives of Europe’s
Lisbon strategy for growth and jobs, at the same time as
promoting personal fulfilment, social cohesion and active
citizenship? (European Commision 2009)
 Tackling the problem of becoming accessible to non-
organised or marginalised young people is now felt by al
key players to be essential to increasing participation by
young people (Commission of the European
Communities 2006).

8. Youth work tensions
 Social care work for young people:
participation in youth work
 concerns on social cohesion –
social problems are problems with young
people
 Social political work with young people:
participation through youth work
 questioning social cohesion
problems of young people are problems with
society
Adapting society to the needs of young people or …
Learning from current citizenship – learning for future citizenship →
widening the gap

9. Reconciling the social and the
pedagogical
 Pedagogical: instrument for social education
 Social: instrument for redistribution of
opportunities
 Recreational: instrument for organisation of
leisure activities
Internal tensions! Youth work is a political activity

10. Youth work is play-work
 Social work + youth movement =
youth work as a method for social
education
 Woodcraft, Public School, Boer War, Jungle Book,
Boys Brigade
 Single concept of boyhood (and youth work)
 3rd educational environment disconnected from 1st & 2nd
 discipline
 Learning by playing
 Ask the boy
 Cultural renewal
 Better “results”!

11. Youth work is social work
 Social work + youth movement
= social movement
youth work as social educational practice
 A dignified approach of the
working youth
 Education, religion, sports,
culture, social action
 Young Catholic Workers
 Collective social action

12. Methodical = Abstraction of context
-do you know that there are young
working class people with problems of
their own?
- I do not know young workers, I only
know young citizens and I want to
create strong-willed young men.
-do you know how young workers have to
survive in factories, how they are
influenced by “workers’ environment”.
How could we help them to stay “good”
or even to have a good influence in
their environment?
-I don’t know the workers’ environment!

13. Conclusion
 Youth work = Social work
 The social as a transit-zone: guiding young
people to include in the social order
 Youth work as a method for social education
 The social as a forum: discussing the way we
relate to each other and the conditions that
structure those relationships and the meaning
of social inclusion
 Youth work as a social educational practice

14. private SOCIAL public
Forum
Transit
zone
SOCIALISATION versus SUBJECTIFICATION

15. Oxymoronic practice
 Transitional forum?
 Keeping up the tension
 Social work between public services and private
associations
 The (re)invention of the social: post-communist,
post-colonial, post-welfare
 New public management?
 back to the future?

16. Youth work and non-formal learning
 Youth work is third socialisation
environment
 Youth work starts where young people are
 Grass does not grow by pulling it
 Münchmeier
 Biographical capabilities
 Institutional
 Political

17. We make the road by
walking
Paolo Freire and Myles Horton