Abstrakti
Within work-based societies, the function and value of individuals are guided and judged through their involvement in work. This means that the characteristics and conduct of the individuals are guided through worker-citizenship ideals. According to youth scholars, young adults particularly face worker-citizenship-related pressures and are expected to strive towards worker-citizenship; education and employment policies not only support but coerce young adults towards efficient labour market integration. However, the labour market has allegedly become more unpredictable and young adults are also required to obtain entrepreneurial-like skills to respond to its risks and changing needs.
Youth researchers have discussed how these institutional work-related expectations create contradictions for young adults when they negotiate their choices and plan their adulthood within an unpredictable contemporary labour market. They claim that within current ‘new adulthood’, contemporary young adults may not have the same opportunities to find a stable foundation for their adulthood as earlier generations. These contradictions described within youth research interests me. Vocational upper secondary education is an intriguing context for young adults’ negotiations as it aims to guide them mainly to become committed and skilled worker-citizens.
I will approach the contradictions by combining Martha Nussbaum’s idea of ‘life worthy of human dignity’ and the academic discussions on the concept of societal belonging. I empirically ask how young vocational upper secondary students and graduates aged 17 to 25 negotiate with the worker-citizenship ideals and understand and position themselves as worker-citizens within the contemporary labour market (RQ1) and how their understandings and experiences as worker-citizens appear regarding societies’ responsibilities to guarantee them the preconditions for societal belonging (RQ2). I examine these questions using group interviews with young vocational students, individual interviews with vocational graduates, and quantitative Finnish Youth Barometer 2019 survey data.
The dissertation contains four research articles. The first article shows how young vocational students—maybe more than other young people—rely on worker-citizenship and their occupational field’s possibilities. The second article shows how vocational students’ views on post-graduation societal belonging are constructed around worker-citizenship. The third article shows how vocational graduates shape their worker-citizenship within quite a complex adulthood. The fourth article focuses on the critical insights of young adults related to worker-citizenship and shows how young adults perceive that the worker-citizenship ideals conflicts with their well-being, life situations, personalities, and hopes.
To summarise and discuss the contradictions within young adults’ negotiations on their societal belonging, I introduce a new concept of ‘epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship’. Using that concept, I demonstrate young adults’ complex negotiations on their worker-citizen selves (who they are, who they want to be, who they should be and who they can be), their societal belonging and their rights to experience societal belonging with the sometimes unrealistic worker-citizenship ideals and within the current conditions of the labour market and post-graduation adulthood.
Based on my findings, I present recommendations for policies guiding vocational education and young adults’ post-graduation employment services. I argue that the epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship constructs a complex and contradictory context for young adults’ negotiations on their societal belonging. I also argue that the epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship is not solved with individual skill-building as it is part of the structures of current society and a reality for young graduates. Therefore, vocational education and post-graduation employment services should have secured resources to better acknowledge the related dissonances. Finally, I argue that understanding the epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship within young adults’ lives is also a question of a sustainable future.
Youth researchers have discussed how these institutional work-related expectations create contradictions for young adults when they negotiate their choices and plan their adulthood within an unpredictable contemporary labour market. They claim that within current ‘new adulthood’, contemporary young adults may not have the same opportunities to find a stable foundation for their adulthood as earlier generations. These contradictions described within youth research interests me. Vocational upper secondary education is an intriguing context for young adults’ negotiations as it aims to guide them mainly to become committed and skilled worker-citizens.
I will approach the contradictions by combining Martha Nussbaum’s idea of ‘life worthy of human dignity’ and the academic discussions on the concept of societal belonging. I empirically ask how young vocational upper secondary students and graduates aged 17 to 25 negotiate with the worker-citizenship ideals and understand and position themselves as worker-citizens within the contemporary labour market (RQ1) and how their understandings and experiences as worker-citizens appear regarding societies’ responsibilities to guarantee them the preconditions for societal belonging (RQ2). I examine these questions using group interviews with young vocational students, individual interviews with vocational graduates, and quantitative Finnish Youth Barometer 2019 survey data.
The dissertation contains four research articles. The first article shows how young vocational students—maybe more than other young people—rely on worker-citizenship and their occupational field’s possibilities. The second article shows how vocational students’ views on post-graduation societal belonging are constructed around worker-citizenship. The third article shows how vocational graduates shape their worker-citizenship within quite a complex adulthood. The fourth article focuses on the critical insights of young adults related to worker-citizenship and shows how young adults perceive that the worker-citizenship ideals conflicts with their well-being, life situations, personalities, and hopes.
To summarise and discuss the contradictions within young adults’ negotiations on their societal belonging, I introduce a new concept of ‘epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship’. Using that concept, I demonstrate young adults’ complex negotiations on their worker-citizen selves (who they are, who they want to be, who they should be and who they can be), their societal belonging and their rights to experience societal belonging with the sometimes unrealistic worker-citizenship ideals and within the current conditions of the labour market and post-graduation adulthood.
Based on my findings, I present recommendations for policies guiding vocational education and young adults’ post-graduation employment services. I argue that the epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship constructs a complex and contradictory context for young adults’ negotiations on their societal belonging. I also argue that the epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship is not solved with individual skill-building as it is part of the structures of current society and a reality for young graduates. Therefore, vocational education and post-graduation employment services should have secured resources to better acknowledge the related dissonances. Finally, I argue that understanding the epistemological dissonance of worker-citizenship within young adults’ lives is also a question of a sustainable future.
| Alkuperäiskieli | Englanti |
|---|---|
| Julkaisupaikka | Tampere |
| Kustantaja | Tampere University |
| ISBN (elektroninen) | 978-952-03-3228-0 |
| ISBN (painettu) | 978-952-03-3227-3 |
| Tila | Julkaistu - 2024 |
| OKM-julkaisutyyppi | G5 Artikkeliväitöskirja |
Julkaisusarja
| Nimi | Tampere University Dissertations - Tampereen yliopiston väitöskirjat |
|---|---|
| Vuosikerta | 933 |
| ISSN (painettu) | 2489-9860 |
| ISSN (elektroninen) | 2490-0028 |