In the article written by Mari-Klose and Moreno titled “Youth, Family Change and Welfare Arrangements” refers to the very issue that the welfare system structures are the main cause of the lack of emancipation in youth specifically in the countries like Spain, Portugal, Greece, Italy or Turkey where the family is the main welfare provider than the state. As a result, the young people’s social rights are in the hands of their families and they cannot emancipate themselves and take a decision for themselves as autonomous individuals in their life trajectories which in long run results with the marginalisation and exclusion of young people. Regarding youth citizenship, the market and family’s role in social service provision is essential. The states’ role is usually to eliminate the social stratification within society. When the state does the service provision, the young people have the autonomy, but when the market or the family does it, the young people are valued concerning their market value or depending on their families to reach social rights. Spain falls into the Southern Welfare States classification due to its social and cultural norms as the family does the service provision.
Thus, the young people’s citizenship depends on their families rather than themselves which results in the denied citizenship of the young people as the statistics elaborated shows the emerging need of the implementation of the project again. To elaborate the context in a deepened manner, we would like to emphasize the three main issues specifically the education attainment in low-socioeconomic backgrounds, the proportion of the NEETs and the proportion of young people living in the family homes to define the context in which we want to address the issue of social welfare systems and implement advocacy and awareness-raising through training for young people and youth workers. The proportion of NEETs in participating countries as 13,3% in Portugal, 16,3% in Spain, 18.4% in Turkey, 19,5% in Greece, 22,5% in Italy and for the female population this ratio goes to twice as more in several countries for example in Turkey it is 52.4% among the female population. In 2019, it was counted that only 18.5% of young people aged between 16 to 29 years in Spain are living outside of their family homes that means that 81% of them are still residing in their family homes which is around 50% in Turkey and 60% in Italy and 54.2% in Portugal. When young people cannot find employment, they are seeking refuge in education and their educational cycle lingers towards to 35-40 ages.
According to the research made by BBVA concerning the youth unemployment refers to this direct issue as the young people do not have any means to search for a job or the subsidiary measures are mainly based in the family/household income rather than the income of the individual lacks the young people’s participation. The education attainment of the young people coming from low socio-economic backgrounds is lower as the education and the expenses comes with it are expected to be covered by the families and if the family cannot provide, the young people decides to involve in the employment in early ages going down up to 16 in the cases of the countries that involved in the project.
Ni-Ni and Yo-Yo : Youth Trajectories and Dilemma of Social Welfare Systems in Southern Europe was one of its kind project involving the youth grassroots and youth experts to attempt to make change in the social welfare systems which is one of the root causes of the Ni-Ni and Yo-Yo youth trajectories. The project name comes from the both Ni-Ni by referring to the NEETs and drawback youth from the society and Yo-Yo by referring to the prolonged Youth and the repetitive trajectory between the state of being youth and state of being adult.
The project aimed to create an awareness on the root causes of these issues which is the Social Welfare system structure in the participating countries as it is widely discussed by the scholars. This issue is very well-known by the youth scholars although among the youth workers it is not discussed or advocated. We want to address these issues for the youth field to act towards to make a change and create a linkage between the youth policy research and the youth practitioners. We aimed to provide a road map for the youth NGOs for advocating the social rights of young people as well as increasing the capacities of youth NGOs in the way of the research with our project as even there are several projects focusing on the very issue of social rights concerning the young people and create an awareness on the issue of the social welfare system by focusing on four areas : housing, education, employment, health rights and participation of the young people.
The objectives of the project :
- To analyse the youth trajectories in Southern Europe countries and implications of Southern Europe Welfare System on young people’s lives
- To develop policy paper as a road map for the governments in respective countries on the life of young people concerning their rights
- To understand the causes behind the existence of NEETs in respective countries and provide a road map for the youth workers to reach these young people
- To increase the skills of youth workers in the issue of denied youth citizenship resulting with the marginalisation and exclusion of young people and tackling situation of prolonged youth and Ni-Ni youth trajectories
The project activities consisted of the following ( please look the above menu about the activities ) :
- Promotion Activities – Opening Events in Each Country
- Kick-Off Planning Meeting in Spain in March 2022
- Development of The Voices of Young People and Youth Trajectories in Southern Europe
- Human Rights of Youth : Training Course for Young People in April 2022
- Human Rights for Youth and Tackling with Denied Youth Citizenship: Methods for Youth Workers in Southern Europe
- Mid-Term Planning Meeting in Greece in February 2023
- Development of Video Series : Stories of Young People in Southern Europe
- Training of Trainers for Youth Workers in March 2023 in Turkey
- Multiplier Events in Each Country Between May 2023 – December 2023
- International Conference in Madrid in January 2024
- Evaluation Meeting in Alcala la Real in January 2024
The project activities were developed to address the issues identified in the participating countries. We have implemented the above-mentioned activities in collective manner with the task division between the partners concerning the strengths and weaknesses of each partner organisations.
The project participants were the young people, youth workers and decision-makers. We have developed three intellectual outputs to address the issues around the human rights of young people and to increase the competences of the youth workers.
We have reached over 1000 people through the research activities, multiplier events and international conferences. During this process, the participants gained skills and knowledge on the issues derived from the social welfare system in participating countries and gain experience in this regard. The capacities of the organizations involved in the project increased and they involved in another projects in international contexts and widened their perspectives.
The project contributed to change on the understanding and perception in participating countries concerning social welfare system and we expect that the project will create a national and international wide impact on the lives of young people through the systematic change on the structures of social welfare systems in Southern Europe countries not only the consortium countries but beyond.
