Snakes & Ladders: Young people, transitions and social exclusion

by Les Johnston, Robert MacDonald, Paul Mason

Underclass theories have proposed that long-term economic exclusion could generate distinct anti-social and anti-work cultures of benefit dependency and crime among young people in poor areas. However, existing research on young people has tended to ignore the different ways in which young people get by, grow up and make transitions to adulthood in areas labelled as socially excluded.  This report explores how young people from one particularly deprived area, facing the same limited opportunities and with similar socioeconomic backgrounds, follow diverse paths and reach strikingly different destinations in their early adulthood. Using in-depth qualitative accounts, the report stresses the importance of understanding how the different aspects of young people's lives - such as education, family, housing and crime - interact to generate the sometimes unpredictable twists and turns of individual transitions. Snakes & Ladders focuses on cameos of six young people whose stories illustrate the overall findings of in-depth interviews with 98 young people. The report identifies themes that can be used to understand the transitions of young people focusing the diversity and complexity of transitions; the influence of locality; processes of inclusion and exclusion; the influence of the family; employment and the local economy; crime, criminal careers and drug use. The report concludes with policy recommendations particularly in relation to the government's new Connexions strategy and service. Snakes & Ladders is essential reading for policy makers and practitioners in key agencies working with young people, national government, and anyone with an interest in young people and social exclusion.

44 pages, Paperback

Published October 18, 2000