Transitions to Adulthood Through Recession consists of a collection of papers by researchers from Britain, Norway, Germany, Portugal, Italy and Greece, locating young people’s transitions to adulthood in their national social, economic and political contexts.

AcknowledgementsContributorsChapter 1 Understanding Youth Transitions in Difficult Times Sarah Irwin, Ann Nilsen Chapter 2 Youth research meets life course terminology: the transition paradigm revisitedKen Roberts Chapter 3 Transitions from school to work in Norway and Britain among three family generations of working class menJulia Brannen, Kristoffer Chelsom Vogt, Ann Nilsen, Abigail KnightChapter 4 How parents see their children’s future: education, work and social change in EnglandSarah IrwinChapter 5 Biography, History and Place: Understanding Youth Transitions in TeessideRobert MacDonald, Tracy ShildrickChapter 6 Social inequality and the transition to education and training: the significance of family background in GermanyBirgit Jentsch, Herwig ReiterChapter 7 Youth transitions and generations in Portugal: examining change between baby-boomers and millennialsNuno Almeida AlvesChapter 8 Young people and housing transitions: the role of intergenerational support in an Italian working class contextElena Mattioli, Nicola De LuigiChapter 9 Young people, transition to adulthood and recession in Greece: In search of a better futureAlexandros Sakellariou, Alexandra KoronaiouChapter 10 Kinship, community and the transition to adulthood – geographical differences and recent changes in European societyPatrick Heady

Against the background of the global financial crisis which has left a legacy of political turmoil and a populist surge across Europe, this book could not be more timely. The contributors offer the reader a comparative understanding of youth inequalities in difficult times. Labour market, family transitions and intergenerational relationships are described and explained from a life course perspective and firmly located in an era of increasing social inequality. The editors are to be commended on pulling together such an excellent collection.Fiona Devine, Head of Alliance Manchester Business School and Professor of Sociology at The University of Manchester, UKSocial change is complicated! This book brilliantly shows and explains how a new generation of young Europeans are living through the consequences of the global financial crisis, recalibrating their expectations and optimising their resources in ways that compound inequality. Empirically robust, theoretically nuanced and rooted in a range of European contexts, this is state of the art youth studies, providing a sense of how we got into this situation, offering the starting point for navigating a more socially just future. Rachel Thomson, Professor of Childhood & Youth Studies, University of Sussex, UK