Education, Work and Social Change

The number of young people not in education, employment or training (NEET) is rising to alarming levels across the globe and costing the economy billions. Current government attempts at diminishing NEET levels have failed to take effect, and the NEET category remains a continuing source of hotly contested public and media interest. This book is based upon a longitudinal study of the lives of a set of young people in the north of England classified as NEET, or at risk of becoming NEET. Drawing on ethnographic data from over two years of fieldwork funded by The Leverhulme Trust, it looks beyond dominant political and media discourses on NEET young people to provide a rich, detailed account of young people's experiences on the margins of education and employment in post-industrial Britain. Education, Work and Social Change uses a critical materialist approach to go beyond the duality of inclusion and exclusion and re-think young people's experiences of participation and non-participation. These, it is argued, can only be fully understood through the concept of marginalization. This text provides fresh and challenging insights into the lives of some of the most vulnerable young people in the United Kingdom and concludes by highlighting the implications of this research for practitioners and policymakers; evaluating current policy initiatives and setting out a range of strategies that should be adopted by local authorities and the government for improving the lives of NEET young people.