Suchergebnisse

Activation policies form the core of employment policies in most OECD countries. They are part of 'active' welfare states and associated neoliberal forms of governance that seek to govern through freedom by producing self-governing and responsible subjectivities. Ethnographies of governmentalities have been used in the research reported in this article to examine if and how such subjectivities are put in practice in street-level encounters in local welfare delivery. Based on an ethnographic research of youth services in the Public Employment Services (PES) in Helsinki, Finland, it is shown that despite the policy focus on active citizenship the street-level practice entails not only liberal ideas of self-governing individuals but also authoritarian measures. What is governed in the meetings is not the young people's selves but their time and behaviour. In the process, the notion of active citizenship is emptied and transformed to mean participation in supervised activities offered by the PES. Such practice also reworks the temporal structures and creates insecure and eventful experience of time for PES clients. In contrast to governing through freedom, the localized interpretation of activation policies represents the authoritarian and paternalistic side of neoliberal governance. ; Peer reviewed

Although broad labour market transformations have altered employment prospects for young people in the Global North, young people remain optimistic about their future employment opportunities. However, there is relatively little research on variations in young people's perceptions. Using data from the Finnish Youth Barometer Survey, we address this gap by analysing young people's perceived employment insecurity—that is, feelings of insecurity about future employment chances. We analyse first the determinants of employment insecurity and second the relationship between non-standard work contracts and employment insecurity in the employed group. The finding showed that economic downturns, immigrant background and unemployment status are associated with insecurity. Having a non-standard contract was associated with more insecurity. Young women feel more insecure than men. This is partly explained by the concentration of non-standard contracts among women. Our results show that there are differences in employment insecurity among young people and that young people react to economic downturns.