The origins of youth social citizenship in Europe: religion, trade unions and income support for young people

Abstract

Abstract This article is concerned with the development of young people’s access to income support in Europe. This access can be either ‘familialized’, where young people are seen as children, which leads low level of welfare generosity, or ‘individualized’, where they are seen as adults, with higher level of welfare generosity. I argue that two main factors can explain such cross-national variation. First, religion (and Protestantism is particular) is the main driver explaining the development of individualization, as opposed to familialization, through long-lasting institutional effects. Secondly, as outsiders on the labour market, the better represented young people are in trade unions, the more likely they are to access individualized generous social benefits. To test this argument, I rely on a multimethod research design: initially proceeding with time-series cross-sectional regressions across 18 countries, from 2001 to 2018, before turning to comparative historical case studies of youth social citizenship development in France, the UK and Sweden.