Student Lives in Crisis: Deepening Inequality in Times of Austerity

ISBN-13: 9781447318248 / Angielski / Miękka / 2016 / 224 str.

Lorenza Antonucci

Opis

The greatest social change in Europe during the last twenty years is that almost half of Europe's young people now attend college. Yet despite these unprecedented levels of university attendance, the lived experiences of students remain largely undocumented. Focusing on the effects of the financial crisis and austerity, this empirically grounded analysis compares the lives of university students from three very different European welfare systems: Italy, England, and Sweden. By contrasting access to welfare support--in connection with the role of families, the state, and the labor market postgraduation--Student Lives in Crisis exposes the students' often overlooked social realities, as well as the impact of their shared experience of financial uncertainty. Drawing on questionnaires and first person interviews, Lorenza Antonucci reveals the misconceptions behind many higher education policies in Europe, demonstrating that university participation exacerbates rather than ameliorates inequalities among young people from different social backgrounds.

Spis treści

Introduction: University Lives in the crisis; Part 1 University for all? How higher education shapes inequality among young people; The social consequences of the mass access in Europe; How welfare influences the lives of youth in university; Beyond differences? Determinants of inequality among European youth in university; Part 2 Exploring the inequality of university lives in England, Italy and Sweden; The five profiles of the university experience; Explaining inequality: the role of social origins and welfare sources; Welfare mixes and the reproduction of inequality in university; Part 3 The ‘eternal transition’: young adults and semi-dependence in university; The family: saviour or ‘inequaliser’?; The labour-market contradiction: a precarious form of dependence; State: generous, conditional or absent?; Conclusion. Addressing the growing inequality among young people in university; Methodological Annex.