Youth on the Move? Exploring Youth Migrations in Eastern Germany and Northern Ireland

Abstract

Within the tradition of studying youth transitions in Europe, considerable depth has been added in recent years to our understanding of how young people move from education to work and enter the adult world. Despite this advance, consideration of youth migration — movement from one region or country to another — has been relatively neglected. While existing studies of youth have not completely ignored migration, specific consideration of the issues facing mobile young people has only recently entered the mainstream of youth studies (see Thomson/Taylor 2005). At European policy level, consideration of youth and migration is somewhat more prominent. Indeed, encouraging transnational movement is a something of a priority for the European Union, as set out in the “New Impetus for European Youth” (2001) White Paper and Action Plan (2002) on mobility. The Commission addresses migration in its White Paper through emphasising the need for mobility in respect to education and training, e.g. promoting trans-European recognition of qualifications and skills, maintaining education and mobility programmes such as Socrates and encouraging the free movement of young people throughout Europe, typically in the form of bilateral or multilateral exchanges; such “mobility,” according to the Commission “the Main Asset of European Integration,” is to be recognised as valuable and obstacles to it should be overcome (2001: 55). The Action Plan (2002) on mobility is more oriented towards employment, promoting openness in and access to European labour markets through measures such as equalising tax and benefit systems and expanding language learning, with the implication that low levels of occupational mobility are an impediment to the establishment of a knowledgebased, service-oriented economy in the EU.