Promoting social Europe? The development of European youth unemployment policies (1997 – 2010)

The institutions of the European Union have intensified their political efforts to combat youth employment since the beginning of the millennium. Youth-specific policy initiatives have been launched since the financial and economic crisis of 2008, and the overall subsequent rise of unemployment rates amongst young people. In this article, we analyse and assess these developments on the basis of an analysis of European policy documents and interviews. Our conclusions are twofold. One the one hand, we argue that the Europe 2020 Strategy and its flagship initiatives devoted to youth do not constitute a new policy field or approach, but are rather the outcome of an incrementalist logic of policy development – not fully supported by neither business associations nor trade unions. On the other hand, an European youth unemployment strategy is perceivably not oriented towards full ‘flexicurity’, because it privileges activation against security, and pushes policy developments towards a minimalist regime of precarious protection. Both developments are explained by the ideational and strategic structures of the European policy arena, i.e., by established discourses and bargains within the EU.