Youth Unemployment and Devolution

Civil Society and Street-Level Responses

Sioned Pearce

• Publisher: Policy Press
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9781447364375
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political Economy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Youth unemployment and work insecurity have been prevailing issues for governments across Western Europe since the 2008 financial crisis. These issues have intensified after Brexit and the pandemic, with young people consistently overrepresented in the gig economy and all forms of work insecurity.

Against a backdrop of increasingly mixed economies of welfare in the UK's liberal welfare regime and work first policy narrative, this book explores civil society responses to youth unemployment in England, Scotland and Wales. Using original, empirical research to challenge the privileging of methodological nationalism in the study of welfare regimes, it analyses the scale and nature of policy and civil society responses to youth unemployment and work insecurity between three nations of the UK from the perspectives of policy makers, strategic thinkers and case workers delivering to young people on the ground.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of abbreviations
• Acknowledgements
• Preface
• 1 Youth unemployment, work insecurity and territorial rescaling
• 2 Youth policy, work and welfare
• 3 A decentralised, street-level approach to analysis
• 4 Devolved civil society approaches
• 5 Devolved civil society networks
• 6 Street-level, cross-jurisdictional perspectives
• 7 Ideologically driven, peripheral policy innovation
• 8 Conclusions
• Appendix: Detail and history of youth employment policy in the UK, England, Scotland and Wales
• Notes
• References
• Index