Arab Spring - Youth's Political Engagement PDF

Journal of Youth Studies
ISSN: 1367-6261 (Print) 1469-9680 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cjys20
Youth mobilisations and political generations:

young activists in political change movements
during and since the twentieth century
Ken Roberts
To cite this article: Ken Roberts (2015) Youth mobilisations and political generations: young
activists in political change movements during and since the twentieth century, Journal of
Youth Studies, 18:8, 950-966, DOI: 10.1080/13676261.2015.1020937
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2015.1020937
Published online: 13 Mar 2015.
Submit your article to this journal
Article views: 862
View related articles
View Crossmark data
Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at

http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=cjys20
Download by: [113.190.155.191] Date: 30 September 2015, At: 11:22

Journal of Youth Studies, 2015
Vol. 18, No. 8, 950966, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2015.1020937
Youth mobilisations and political generations: young activists in

political change movements during and since the twentieth century
Ken Roberts*
Department of Sociology, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

(Received 22 September 2014; accepted 28 January 2015)
This paper uses political generations theory to examine the main youth mobilisations
Downloaded by [113.190.155.191] at 11:22 30 September 2015
during and since the twentieth century: pre-1939 fascist and communist movements;
the student movements of the 1960s and 70s; movements that challenged colonial and
neo-colonial rulers in less developed countries and young peoples involvement in the
revolutions that saw the end of communism in East-Central and South-East Europe in
1989. Conclusions from this review of the past are used in considering the likely
significance of subsequent outbursts of political activism among young people: the
colour revolutions and other instances of youth mobilisation in former Soviet
republics and other ex-communist countries; the Arab Spring and the series of
movements that have challenged neo-liberalism Anti-Globalisation, the Indignados
and the Occupy movements. The paper notes that youth mobilisations that have led to
the formation of new political generations that have changed their countries politics
then transformed the countries have typically extended over several decades, that
initially youthful leaders have sometimes been middle-aged or older before achieving
political power and that many of their actions on achieving power have been at
variance with their youthful ideals. In conclusion, it is argued that it is still too early to
tell whether any of the recent youth mobilisations signal the formation of new political
generations.
Keywords: Arab Spring; Indignados; Occupy movement; political generations;
student movements; youth
Introduction
This paper revisits the past in order to gain a better understanding of the present. The
past, for our purposes, begins with the Young Turks of 1908. They were young army
officers who led a successful rebellion against the Ottoman monarchy and ruled Turkey
until the end of World War I. Subsequently all groups of young upstarts have been likely
to be labelled Young Turks. The past ends, for our purposes, with the revolutions in
Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union in 19891991. These events are now sufficiently far
in the past for us to overview their causes, development and outcomes. The present, for
our purposes, overlaps with the past in starting with the Anti-Globalisation movement
whose first protests were in 1988 and 1989 but is best recalled for its massive
demonstrations in 1999 and 2001 at Seattle and Genoa. The present also includes the
*Email: bert@liverpool.ac.uk
This paper has been prepared for FP7-SSH-2013-2 SAHWA: empowering the young generation;
towards a new social contract in South and East Mediterranean countries.
2015 Taylor & Francis
Journal of Youth Studies 951
colour revolutions that occurred between 2003 and 2005 and other instances of youth
mobilisation in former communist countries and continues up to 2011 which was the year
of the Arab Spring, Spains Indignados and the Occupy movement. The reading of the
past that follows suggests that it is best to regard these recent mobilisations as events in
historical processes that are still incomplete. The revolution in Belgrade in 2000 (the fall
of Milosevic) might be regarded as among the last in the chain of events that began in
1989 or a precursor of the colour revolutions that were to follow. Probably, it was both.
The coverage of youth mobilisations since the beginning of the twentieth century is
neither exhaustive nor representative. The focus is on the higher profile mobilisations that
have left a mark on history, at least in becoming part of recorded history. All the
mobilisations that are considered below, past and present, have occurred in North
America, Europe or African or Middle-East countries with histories as colonies or
protectorates of European powers. Mobilisations in Asia and Latin America do not
feature. However, these biases in the coverage of youth mobilisations do not detract from
their fitness for purpose here, which is to generate rather than to test theory.
Representativeness is not essential for this purpose. Nevertheless, the value of using the
past as an aid to understanding the likely historical significance of recent and ongoing
outbursts of youth political activism, if demonstrated, will encourage the use of the same
methodology elsewhere.
Much recent research into youth and politics has been pre-occupied with levels of
interest and involvement, which turn out to depend on how widely or narrowly politics is
defined. That said, in Western Europe there has been a trend since the 1960s for voter
turnout at elections to decline as have memberships of the main political parties. Young
novice electors have always been less likely to cast their votes than older citizens, and the
proportion of young people who do so has declined as part of the general downward
trend, but among young people the dip has been particularly steep. Voting has held up
best among the oldest age groups. Another trend throughout Western Europe has been a
decline in the proportion of all votes that go to the parties that are still most likely to form
governments. The minor parties that have benefited from this trend have differed by time
and place (International IDEA 2004). Young peoples propensity to engage in single-issue
movements rather than to join the main political parties in their countries can, once again,
be regarded as an extreme version of a more general trend. The recession triggered by the
financial crash of 20082009 appears to have added momentum to the spread of
resentment towards the entire political classes in Western countries, alongside sullen
resignation and disengagement rather than revolt (Clark and Heath 2014).
It also used to be the case, when turnout at elections and party memberships were
higher and when more adults had stable loyalties to their countries main political parties,
that many young people inherited party loyalties through their families in much the same
way as religious and national identities are normally acquired (Rose and McAllister
1990). Cognitive knowledge of what the parties, religions and nations stood for came
later. Individuals could change their allegiances, but at least they had start-points in their
political careers. As the proportion of parents with strong party allegiances has declined,
fewer young people have been given such start-points. These young people become the
next generation of parents and this trend may continue until something happens, like new
circumstances and challenges provoking the mobilisation of a new political generation.
In recent years, the generation concept has been used in youth studies with increasing
frequency alongside a heated debate about the concepts meaning (for reviews, see France
and Roberts 2015; Leccardi and Feixa 2010). No one has monopoly rights over how to
952 K. Roberts
define words, and generation can be used in various senses, but since we can also speak
of age groups and cohorts, it is advisable to separate these from generations. An age
group exists (with a fluid population) at all times. A cohort experienced an event, usually
but not necessarily being born, at a particular time (a year or decade, for example). These
are the closest equivalents to family generations. Generation is best applied to wider
social formations only when a cohort has an experience which sets it apart from
predecessors (and possibly though not necessarily from successor cohorts also). The
distinctive experience may be a change in education, in labour market conditions or in
cultural tastes. However, since there is something new in the experience of every cohort
in modern societies which change constantly, generation is probably best reserved for
historically new experiences which make its members different in some way for the
remainder of their lives. Cohorts born in China since 1980 appear to be a genuine new
generation in this sense (Lian 2014). Entering the labour market at a time of high
unemployment appears to have long-term scarring effects (see, for example Bell,
Bindler, and Machin 2014). The generation difference may be specific to a single life
domain. For example, early career experience of unemployment may have career-long
consequences in terms of types of jobs obtained, risks of further unemployment and
standards of living, but leave political proclivities unaffected. This paper, therefore, is
specifically about political generations, whose politics differ from those of predecessors
but not necessarily from the politics of cohorts that follow for a political generation may
outlast any single cohorts lifetime. This paper does not engage with the cross-cutting but
different literature on new social movements: these may develop and recruit within or
from several cohorts or generations.
Past and present are viewed through the prism of the theory of political generations.
Karl Mannheim (18931947) is best known as a founder of the sociology of knowledge,
but he also became and continues to be the most common start-point for discussions
about political generations though the foundations left by Mannheim cannot be described
as substantial one essay (in German) that was first published in 1928 and which was
translated and first published in English language in 1952 (see Mannheim 1928 [1952])
by which time Mannheim had died aged 54 in 1947. Mannheim was born in Hungary but
began his academic career in Germany before moving to England in 1933, the year when
Hitlers Nazis assumed power in Berlin. Mannheim was inevitably profoundly influenced
by his experiences in Germany and neighbouring countries during the 1920s and 30s
when communist and fascist parties were mobilising and marching.
Mannheim was just one among many scholars who discussed the new political forces
that were mobilising in Europe in the 1920s and 30s. He was not among the first, nor was
he the only scholar of his era, to use the term political generation. The work of Ortega y
Gasset gained far more attention at the time (see, for example Ortega y Gasset 1930
[1932]). However, Mannheims work has been a more appealing start-point for
subsequent sociologists because his ideas about political generations were grounded in
his broader sociology of knowledge (see Mannheim 1936), and for studies of youth
politics in particular because of Mannheims interest in education, especially education
for democracy (see Mannheim and Stewart 1962). Mannheims main base after moving to
Britain was at London Universitys Institute of Education.
Mannheim (1928 [1952]) argued that every cohort of young people was likely to be
deeply affected by political events and circumstances at the time when they were first
becoming politically aware, that is, during their youth. In this, Mannheim has proved
correct. For example, throughout the rest of their lives, people are most likely to be able
to recall and date political events that occurred when they were first becoming aware of
the political significance of such events (see, for example Schuman and Corning 2000).
From then onwards individuals are likely to know where they stand, whose sides they are
on and can respond to future events accordingly. Mannheim appears to have believed that
every cohort of young people could become a new political generation with its own
distinctive consciousness. The evidence assembled below suggests that it is best to
envisage vanguards of new political generations being formed only in periods of major
historical change. We also know that many members of any cohort may remain
completely indifferent to political events throughout their teenage years and that the
development of firm political attitudes, if this ever occurs, may last until members of a
cohort are aged 30-something (see Burnett 2000). Ever since Mannheim, the kinds of
political events that have been regarded as likely to lead to the formation of a distinctive
generational consciousness have been wars, terrorist incidents, deep economic recessions
and suchlike (as, for example by Edmunds and Turner 2005), but since the development
of welfare states, it is possible that any new generations will also have been influenced by
their experiences as taxpayers, users of welfare and other state services, and as employees
and customers of state enterprises, agencies and government departments. One of
Mannheims propositions that has so far stood the test of time is that any new political
generation is likely to be divided into different units or factions.
Youth, in the context of a generation perspective, has to be defined as a relationship
(with elders), and the youth mobilisations considered in this paper are those in which
substantial numbers of participants have seen themselves, and have been regarded by
others, as an upcoming, usurping generation rather than instances (which occur
everywhere at all times) of young people being mobilised by incumbent politicians or
their representatives. There is always likely to be a contest between the efforts of those in
power to recruit young supporters and successors and challengers who self-mobilise
against those who are currently powerful.
From a political generations perspective, exactly how many or how few young
people are politically engaged at any time is not the crucial issue because incumbent
politicians are inevitably replaced by members of younger cohorts, and there are no
recorded instances of there not being enough. Cohort replacement among adult voters or
subjects is equally inevitable. The historical trend towards lower levels of political
engagement in Western democracies since the mid-twentieth century suggests that
loyalties to existing political elites have loosened, thereby rendering upcoming cohorts
available for mobilisation as activists or just supporters in elections of usurping
movements. Mobilisation by upcoming challengers will not necessarily lead to successful
challenges to those currently in power, but unless some young people self-mobilise,
thereby forming a consciousness of being a new challenging generation, it is most likely
that politics will simply continue as usual. If some young people self-mobilise, they can
then contest and seek to mobilise wider support among significant constituencies which
may be all those who are entitled to vote in elections, party members in one-party
political systems and sometimes officers and ranks in countries armed forces.
The past
The original Young Turks did not become the vanguard of a new political generation
because Turkey was defeated in World War I. The new political generation that
transformed Turkey was mobilised by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk (18811938), another
954 K. Roberts
army officer, who led the forces in the post-1918 war for Turkeys independence, then the
movement that established the modern Republic of Turkey in 1923.
The inter-war fascist and communist movements are referred to subsequently for
purposes of comparison. Here we can simply note that in Europe the communists were
always challenging, usurping movements and were unsuccessful everywhere in Europe
except in Russia in 1917, whereas the fascists were sometimes usurpers, as in Germany,
while in Spain and Portugal they were defending regimes that were being challenged by
socialists, and in other countries neo-fascist regimes were formed as political parties
collapsed into one another in support of national unity governments. These points noted,
we can proceed immediately into the postWorld War II era.
Student movements in the 1960s

The student movements of the 1960s and 70s have been models for future young and
older observers of young people in the West. They have structured expectations about the
likely features of successor movements and in doing so may have tended to mislead. The
student movements of the 1960s and 70s had origins in the civil rights protests that began
in the USA in the 1950s and the peace (anti-H bomb) marches and demonstrations in
Europe. During the 1960s, the protests spread across both continents, and more thinly in
other parts of the world, focusing on opposition to American involvement in the Vietnam
War, but the movements adopted a wider range of new issues second-wave feminism,
environmentalism and global justice. All these were embraced within a call for greater
personal freedom. The young protesters were unimpressed by the futures that were laid
out before them: careers in dull bureaucracies and family lives in little boxes. Political
messages were blended with anthems from the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez,
hippie dress, the recreational use of drugs and the sexual liberation that accompanied the
marketing of the contraceptive pill from 1961. In Paris in 1968, student protests drew in
trade unions, and the French government felt threatened (very briefly).
This wave of protests was the work of what Ronald Inglehart (1977) called the post-
scarcity generation. Many commentators at that time interpreted the student movements
as a clash of generations (see, for example Eisenstadt 1964; Feuer 1968), but Ingleharts
research (which has since broadened into the World Values Surveys) was the first to show
that there had indeed been a shift towards what are now described as postmodern
values. The post-war baby boomers were the first young people to grow up with no
experience of even the threats of poverty and unemployment. Jobs and rising standards of
living were taken for granted, and as the generation grew to political maturity and became
majorities of voters and politicians, quality of life issues were pushed up political
agendas (Reich 1972; Roszak 1970). Only minorities of students were involved in any
protests during the 1960s and 1970s (Blackstone et al. 1970) but there are senses in which
the activists spoke for a wider section of their generation. As they grew older, many
aspects of the counter-culture of the 1960s (gender and race equality, and tolerance of
alternative families, sexual behaviour and sexualities) became mainstream.
Social science learnt a great deal from studies of this particular generation. Their
biographies appeared to confirm Karl Mannheims proposition that political events
experienced during youth, when a cohort is first becoming politically aware, make a
profound and lasting impression (Schuman and Corning 2000). However, we now know
that youthful ideals may be retained but are not necessarily acted on throughout
adulthood. Many who rejected materialism in the 1960s built lucrative careers in
business, management and the professions (Fendrich 1977), and this generation (though
not necessarily the same individuals who were radicals in their student days) became the
adult voters and politicians who ushered in the neo-liberal era. Those who pursued
careers in politics often made U-turns in response to opportunities and circumstances
encountered later on. These were comparable turnarounds to those of the generation of
the young fascists and communists of the 1920s and 1930s. It was this generation that
built the post-1945 social democracies in Western Europe. That said, most post-1945
European social democratic politicians had not been fascists or communists in the 1930s.
They had either been in prison, opposition, or silently acquiescent. By 1945, the entire
generation had clearly become disillusioned with fascism and its outcomes including
defeat in the war, and more was known about Stalins Russia. In a comparable manner, by
the 1980s the post-scarcity generation was likely to be reacting to the costs to taxpayers
of social democracy and to their experiences as public sector employees, recipients of
welfare rights and consumers of state services.
Anti-colonial and neo-colonial movements

The student protesters and hippies of the 1960s may be the Wests favoured model, but in
what were then becoming known as third-world, developing or under-developed
societies, young people were becoming active in movements intent on changing these
countries. These political change generations were being formed in locations other than
city streets and university campuses, and in some cases were seizing power. These
movements sought independence, first from colonial powers, then afterwards from neo-
colonial elites to whom power was passed without much else changing. The young
activists were often young army officers. They included Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918
1970) who was among the young Egyptian army officers who overthrew King Farouk in
1952, Muammar Gaddafi (19422011) who was also part of a group of young army
officers when they overthrew Libyas King Idris in 1969, and Saddam Hussein (1937
2006) who was part of the military group that seized power in Iraq in the 1968 rebellion.
Armies as well as universities can nurture new political generations. The original Young
Turks were from Ottoman Turkeys army.
In other colonies and ex-colonies, in the decades before, during and following World
War II, new generations were formed in political parties that eventually propelled their
leaders into power. Morocco and Tunisia made peaceful transitions to independence when
French colonial rule ended in 1956. In Algeria, which had larger numbers of European
settlers, independence followed a savage liberation war which lasted from 1954 until
1962. In each of these cases, the new leaders of the independent countries had been
among the founders of independence movements in their own youth, before World War
II, and the regimes that they established endured up to, and in some cases beyond, the
Arab Spring of 2011. Other examples of young activists for whom victory took a long
time include the young Robert Mugabe (1924) who became Secretary-General of the
Zimbabwe African National Union in the 1960s (in what was then Southern Rhodesia)
and was elected president in the first elections held under universal adult suffrage in
1980. Nelson Mandela (19182013) became a founder member of the African National
Congress Youth League in 1944, and after 27 years in prison became the first elected
president of post-apartheid South Africa in 1994. This particular new political generation,
formed when the activists were all young, had to wait a long time before achieving
956 K. Roberts
political power. There are further examples of this. These include the other classes of
68 that were formed in East European countries.
In the twenty-first century some countries leaders waged war against others who
would have been regarded as kindred radical spirits in the 1960s. Each side would no
doubt argue that the other had changed beyond recognition since then. In this case, each
side has probably been correct.
Revolutions in Eastern Europe

Two political generations triumphed in 1989. For several years before then young people
who were living under communism had been able to signal support for change by playing
Western popular music and wearing Western fashions (Pilkington 1994). During 1989,
they demonstrated on the streets of Poland, the German Democratic Republic and
Czechoslovakia. They celebrated the outcome of the 4 June election in Poland, then
iconically on 9 November when the Berlin Wall was opened (by the East German
authorities).
However, these revolutions were really due to the efforts of an older political
generation whose formative political experiences were before, during and following the
revolt in Budapest in 1956 and the Prague Spring in 1968 when attempted reforms in
Hungary and Czechoslovakia were crushed by Soviet tanks. Dissent went underground
but was not extinguished, and in 1980 a free trade union called Solidarity was formed in
Poland which refused to disband or even go underground despite the imposition of
martial law and the imprisonment of its leaders. A key event was the appointment of
Mikhail Gorbachev as head of the Soviet regime in 1985. He had once been part of a new
generation in the USSR that was engaged in building communism throughout the
enlarged post-1945 Soviet empire. Gorbachev was evidently from a faction of that
generation that had been frustrated by the particular version of communism that was then
being built under the leadership of Josef Stalin. Gorbachev and some contemporaries
wanted to reform the system, and their key policies on achieving office were glasnost
(freedom of expression) and perestroika (reform). Gorbachev informed communist rulers
in East-Central Europe that the Soviet army would not intervene should they lose the
support of their people. This warning was intended to re-invigorate the communist
systems. In the event, Gorbachevs measures did not reform communism but led to its
collapse. Polands rulers were obliged to hold roundtable talks with Solidarity and agree
to free elections. The outcome on 4 June (the true history-making date in 1989) surprised
everyone. Solidarity won all but one of the seats that were up for election. Solidarity was
surprised. Polands communists were devastated and faded into the background before
reorganising themselves as social democrats the following autumn. By then, Poland had a
post-communist government. The possibility of change had been demonstrated and the
impetus spread from country to country.
Hungary accelerated its liberalisation programme and opened its border with Austria.
This led to the Trabant exodus. East Germans motored through Czechoslovakia into
Hungary, then through Austria and into West Germany. During September, crowds began
marching in Leipzig and other East German cities. During the autumn, crowds assembled
and remained in Pragues Wenceslas Square. On 25 December, the Ceausescus were
summarily executed in Bucharest and communism had ended throughout East-Central
and South-East Europe except in Yugoslavia where change was more protracted (see
Roberts 2012a). None of the former communist countries new leaders were from the
youth who had taken to the streets in 1989. Solidaritys main spokesperson and the
countrys first post-communist president was a middle-aged electrician, Lech Walesa
(1943). In Czechoslovakia the spokesperson for Civic Forum and the first elected
president was an ageing playwright, Vaclav Havel (19362011). The first democratically
elected president in Bulgaria in 1992 was Zhelyu Zhelev, a philosopher known for his
samizdat publications during communism.
We should note that the revolutions in 1989 were not pro-capitalism. The street
protestors were not demanding the dismantling of welfare states (Ferge 1997; Kovacheva
2000a). Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher were heroes because they were so
stridently anti-communist, which meant anti-Russia, which was enough to earn them cult
status in East-Central Europe. In Poland there were hopes that the newly independent,
overwhelmingly Roman Catholic country would re-moralise a decadent Europe. The
1989 revolutions were nationalist. The people wanted to rule their own countries.
Workers wanted control of their own industries. This meant dispensing with Soviet/
Russian domination. It was only following the collapse of the economies in the early-
1990s that integration into Western capitalism, the European Union (EU) and NATO
became the goals of the countries post-communist rulers.
East-Central Europes revolutions were from below, by the people, the usurpers.
The Soviet Union ended with revolutions from above, the result of splits and conflicts
within the Soviet political elite from which Gorbachevs faction emerged as a loser. In
most of the new independent states, the communist rulers simply rebranded themselves as
nationalists and democrats. New recruits into the political elite in Dneipropetrovsk (a
major city in Ukraine) tended to be from the Komsomol (the Communist Party youth
organisation) rather than rock n roll (Zhuk 2010).
Retrospect and prospect

There are lessons from the past that we can usefully absorb before proceeding to the
present.
First, some new political generations achieve power and implement their change
agendas very quickly. This is most likely when a key change event is a military coup.
Otherwise, new political generations may have to wait decades before achieving political
power. The once youthful leaders of the African National Congress are the main
twentieth-century example. When a new generation takes over gradually, like the baby-
boomer post-scarcity generation in Western countries, their agendas for change (gender
equality, for example) may never be fully accomplished.
Second, when new political generations achieve power, the policies that they
implement may not be those that they sincerely advocated when young. Circumstances
and events are likely to have intervened. The student radicals of the 1960s did not expect
their generation to include the authors of neo-liberalism who privatised former state-
owned industries and started to dismantle welfare states.
Third, people of any age can join a new political generation, and old political
generations can continue to recruit young people. According to Muna, Stanton, and
Mwau (2014), Africas politics are usually struggles within the political classes between
Young Turks who are seeking to accelerate the replacement of Old Guards. These
struggles are about status and power, not policies, and do not resemble genuine
mobilisations of young usurpers. Cohort replacement can proceed without changing the
958 K. Roberts
character of incumbent political elites. We can now see that this is the norm. Change
generations are created by exceptional cohorts.
The present
Given the foregoing, it will be no surprise that the following passages argue that youth
mobilisations since the early-1990s are best regarded as events in still far from complete
historical processes. It will be argued that potential new political generations exist in
Eastern Europe and the ex-Soviet Union, and also in the West, but the outcomes are
uncertain and are likely to remain so for several decades. North Africa and the Middle-
East are different. It is still too soon to say whether the Arab Spring of 2011 has signalled
the formation of new political generations or was just the latest in a long-running series of
uprisings against neo-colonial or otherwise authoritarian rulers.
The colour revolutions and other mobilisations in ex-communist countries

It is impossible to offer any reliable estimate of the proportion of young people who were
involved in any political activity during 1989, but there was confidence at the time that
the advent of true democracy would lead to an upsurge and a broader blossoming of
civil societies in all the East European countries. Young people would have a choice of
political parties. They would be able to speak their minds and associate freely. Above all,
they would be able to participate in rebuilding their countries thereby building their own
lives while helping to make history. A surprise for researchers was that the expected high
level of interest and active engagement in politics did not happen which prompted some
to speak about the strange death of civil society (see Lomax 1997) and the fruitless
attempts to build a civil society without citizens (Mihailov 2005). Perhaps, it is more
accurate to say that subsequent political activity by young people has not been in the
ways that were expected joining and becoming active members of the political parties
that contest elections.
Most young people have known how they want their post-communist countries to
develop. In the early-1990s, the youth of Eastern Europe were the continents most
enthusiastic Europeans, eager for their countries to become full members of the EU (see,
for example Kovacheva 1995; Mitev 1998; Niznik and Skotnicka-Illasiewicz 1992).
Membership of the EU and other Western-based international organisations has had their
overwhelming support, and all post-communist leaders in Eastern Europe (west of
Ukraine) have endorsed these goals. The problem for their citizens, young and old, has
been the slow (if any) pace of change in their own lives. It took very little time for young
voters to grow disillusioned with their new post-communist political elites. The context
was the big problem: the countries economies imploded and living standards fell
alarmingly. Politicians rapidly became figures of ridicule and contempt, and hence, before
long, the return of ex-communists to power in some of the countries. Young people were
unimpressed by the squabbling of politicians in democratically elected assemblies. They
soon became suspicious of politicians real motives, especially when politicians lifestyles
were grossly out of line with their official salaries. By the mid-1990s, most young people
felt that most politicians were in politics to serve their own interests rather than to serve
their countries (Mitev 2005; Roberts 2009; Roberts, Predborska, and Ivaschenko 2004).
Inta Mierina (2014) argues that in Latvia the dismal performances of politicians (as
judged by voters) has led to a vicious spiral of loss of trust and political disengagement.
The atypical young people who have joined political parties since 1989 are an
important group not on account of their size, which is tiny, but because they have been
slowly replenishing their countries political elites. These are now composed of mixtures
of pre- and post-1989 entrants to politics. Most young political activists in Eastern Europe
since 1989, as under communism, have not been just enthusiastic supporters but have
been at least interested in the possibility of building political careers. This has not
necessarily meant becoming an elected politician, the first step towards which has been
inclusion on a partys list of candidates. From this position, there have been good chances
of election to a parliamentary assembly where the party has a chance of gaining a share of
power. However, a political career can also be built by joining the new nomenklatura,
that is the class of political appointees. These positions may be in public administration, a
public service or a business in which a government has a stake.
Voters in countries that have joined the EU can use their votes to dismiss their
governments and promote different parties and politicians into power, but, they ask, what
difference does this make? There appears to be just an exchange of positions within the
same political class. In countries that have opted for so-called managed democracy (or
had this imposed from above) protestors have taken to the streets enraged by the alleged
falsification of election results (further evidence, if any was needed, of the corruption of
politics). The events of 1991 in the USSR were revolutions from above, the result of
splits in the communist elites. Old rulers were not usually replaced by newcomers to
power. Georgia, whose first president following independence (Gamsakhurdia) was from
outside the old communist elite, was a rare exception, but he was replaced by the end of
1992 by Shevarnadze, a former USSR foreign minister. Young people were not especially
prominent when most ex-Soviet republics celebrated independence in 1991.
The colour revolutions that occurred between 2003 and 2005 are the best known, but
they are far from the only instances of youth mobilising in political campaigns in Eastern
Europe and the former Soviet Union since 1991. Young people were rock dancing in
Slovakia in the summer of 1998 in the campaign that led to the defeat of Vladimir
Meciars government. In Bulgaria, mass protests and student occupations of university
buildings continued well into the first half of the 1990s, and street demonstrations and
road blockades toppled the governments in office in 1997 and 2013. Rallies and
occupations of public buildings in a series of anti-government protests shook Hungary in
2006, triggered by a pre-Wikileak scandal caused by the release of Prime Minister Ferenc
Gyurcsny's speech in which he confessed that his party had lied to win the 2006
election. In the territories of the former German Democratic Republic and in Hungary,
young people have been prominent in nationalist, so-called far right political
movements, as has been the case in some West European countries.
In 2000, young people demonstrated and marched in Belgrade under the slogan Otpor
(Resistance), in the campaign which led to the defeat of Milosevic. Otpor then acted as a
model for the mobilisation of young people in the subsequent colour revolutions.
Activists in different countries supplied each other with advice and information. In
Georgia in 2003, young people mobilised under the slogan Kmara (Enough), and in Kiev
in 20042005, the slogan was Pora (Its time). All these youth mobilisations received
some funds and much advice from North American sources. The links between these
movements included cultural inspiration, political encouragement and activist training
and allowed analysts to speak about the formation of a transnational movement in the
former Soviet Republics (Baev 2011; Beachain and Polese 2010; Bunce and Wolchik
2006; Collin 2007). There were unsuccessful attempts to repeat the successes of Otpor,
960 K. Roberts
Kmara and Pora in Belarus where the slogan was Zubr (Blue) and Azerbaijan under the
slogan Yohk (No!).
Kyrgyzstans Tulip Revolution of 2005 followed just one year after, but should really
be treated separately from the Rose Revolution in Georgia and the Orange Revolution in
Ukraine. All three revolutions were against allegedly corrupt regimes which had
massaged election results, but the Kyrgyzstan revolution was not the work of young
people so much as replacing a president from the north with one from the south of the
republic, and lives were lost during the confrontations in Bishkek to which demonstrators
from the south had travelled. There was a further revolution in Kyrgyzstan when more
lives were lost in 2010 when a president from the north was elected. This was followed
by communal violence in the south between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in which several
hundred (mainly Uzbeks) were killed and thousands fled (temporarily) across the border
into Uzbekistan. This was a repetition of the communal violence that had erupted in 1991
when the Soviet Union disbanded. Many young people were involved in these events, but
the events were not led or instigated by young people, and the main confrontations were
not between generations.
We should note that all the successful colour revolutions were actually triggered by
splits within the countries political classes. Petro Poroshenko who became President of
Ukraine in 2014 is another example of insider turned usurper. The usurpers have all been
current or former insiders. After the so-called revolutions, up to now, politics has
continued as before (the business of the political classes), and young people have returned
to their families, schools or jobs (as in 1989) and soon recovered their anger. The colour
revolutions were not true revolutions as had occurred between 1989 and 1991.
Subsequent mobilisations have led, at best, merely to regime change.
The Arab Spring

This is the name given to the series of mass protests that began at the start of 2011. Young
people were very high profile, which will be due, at least in part, to the demography of
cities in the global south (Hansen 2008). The countries have young populations, and
their young people have been moving into cities despite facing chronic shortages of
housing and employment. Like the youth mobilisations in former communist countries,
the Arab Spring is probably best regarded as a still incomplete process. We can analyse
the background and chronology of 2011, but the eventual course of events and the
outcome(s) remain unknown. Most mobilisations, from the communist and fascist
movements of the 1920s and 1930s, through the student movements of the 1950s
1970s, have lasted (albeit discontinuously) for several decades.
The spark that ignited the Arab Spring was struck on 17 December 2010 in Sidi
Bouzid, a small town in Tunisia, when a 26-year-old street vendor, Mohamed Bouzizi, set
fire to himself when instructed to cease trading because he did not have a valid licence, or
because his licence was confiscated by a police officer. There are different versions of this
story. However, there is no dispute that Bouzizi died on 4 January 2011, and this sparked
29 days of sustained protest, beginning in Tunis, the capital city, and ended only when
President Ben Ali fled. By then protests had started in Jordan (14 January) and Oman (17
January), followed by a Day of Rage called for 25 January in Cairos Tahrir Square
which became the site of a sustained protest which ended only when President Mubarak
stepped down on 11 February. Protests began in Yemen on 27 January, in Bahrain on 14
February, in Benghazi (Libya) over the death of a human rights lawyer on 15 February, in
Morocco on 20 February and in Syria on 15 March. There were shorter lived outbursts in
some other countries (Honwana 2013; Osman 2013; Vanderwalle 2012).
The role of the new media in the rapid spread of these protests is disputed. Facebook
and Twitter are said to have been crucial in drawing the initial crowds. YouTube could
spread anger by posting images of police brutality, often recorded on mobile phones
(Shahine 2011). However, at the beginning of 2011 only around a quarter of Egypts
population was using the Internet and less than 6% used Facebook (Noueihed and Warren
2013). Al-Jazeera, the television channel, was probably crucial in creating a transnational
public sphere and in amplifying messages with new media origins. It is noteworthy that
wherever the protests led to elections, the Twitterati were likely to be shocked to
discover that they were nowhere near 50% let alone 99%.
The outcomes (up to 2014) of these protests have differed from country to country.
Protests were quickly suppressed or ended with minor concessions in Bahrain, Jordan,
Oman and Morocco. There was no Arab Spring in Algeria. There were changes of
government in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and in Libya after intervention by NATO forces,
the death of Gaddafi on 20 October 2011 and the election of a General National Congress
in July 2012. In Syria, the protests in Damascus during March 2011 have led to a
prolonged civil war. In Egypt, elections in December 2011/January 2012 made the
Freedom and Justice Party (representing the Moslem Brotherhood) the largest group in
the new parliament, and the presidential election in July 2012 produced a Moslem
Brotherhood winner, Mohamed Morsi. The parliament was dissolved by Egypts
judiciary, and in July 2013 President Morsi was deposed in an army coup which was
followed by the arrest of Moslem Brotherhood leaders and the shooting of hundreds of
Moslem Brotherhood street protesters. Tahrir Square was the site of further demonstra-
tions, supporting and celebrating the armys latest actions. During 2014 an ex-army
general (Sisi), who had led the coup against Morsi, was elected president.
Resisting neo-liberalism
A series of new generations in Western countries has been announced since the student
movements of the 1960s and 70s subsided: generation Y, the ecstasy generation, the
Internet generation and so on. These have not been generations in which youth have
mobilised in movements to change their societies. They have merely headlined new
features of the youth life stage. The first potential true successor generation to the student
movements is still in formation and it is being formed in opposition to the neo-liberal
policies, and the effects of these policies, that have spread globally since the 1980s,
promoted and enforced by transnational organisations, mainly the International Monetary
Fund (IMF), the World Bank (WB), the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the EU.
The core neo-liberal policies are free markets and free movement of goods and capital
(but not people), and the removal of state subsidies and protection from extractive and
manufacturing industries, and even public utilities and services which are thereby
exposed to competition from local and international profit-seeking companies.
Anti-Globalisation was the first mass resistance movement. Its title was misleading.
The movement was not opposed to internationalism per se. Indeed, it is the only
movement that has drawn together youth from many different countries since the
International Brigades mobilised from 1936 to 1939 to oppose the coup led by General
Franco in Spain. Anti-Globalisation was against the transfer of power from democrat-
ically elected governments to global capital, its owners and representatives. Its first major
962 K. Roberts
demonstration was at an IMF/WB meeting in Berlin in 1988. This was followed by a

mass protest at a 1989 Paris meeting of the G7 (heads of government in the worlds seven
largest economies), and an IMF/WB meeting in Madrid in 1994. However, the truly
mammoth Anti-Globalisation demonstrations were at a meeting of the WTO in Seattle in
1999, then at a G8 meeting in Genoa in 2001. These were the first mass mobilisations in
which new technologies (mobile phone, email and Internet websites) were noted as
playing significant roles. All authorities found these events difficult to police since there
were no leaders to negotiate with or to arrest. We should note that Anti-Globalisation did
not mobilise global youth. When the movement was at its height, youth in Eastern Europe
were supporting their governments efforts to attract direct foreign investment.
The Generation of 1000 did not become a youth movement, but it spread awareness
across Europe that young peoples salaries were declining in real terms (when they could
obtain jobs) and that the generation was at risk of being unable to live as well as its
parents. These fears are proving well founded (Roberts 2012b). Generation 1000 was
the title of an Italian book by Antonio Incorvio and Alessandro Rimassa that was
published on the Internet in 2005 and instantly went viral. The book subsequently
became a film. In 2005, 1000 per month was the typical starting pay being offered to
university graduates across Southern Europe and sometimes in Northern European
countries as well. The change since 2008, the year of the banking crisis, has been a
further depression of youth salaries. These dipped to under 500 in Greece in 2011.
During 2011, thousands of young Greeks joined a series of demonstrations in Athens
against the austerity policies that were being imposed by the troika (the IMF, the
European Central Bank and the European Commission), but these were not specifically
youth mobilisations. Then in 2011, Spain became the second EU member state (Greece
had been the first) in which the youth unemployment rate rose above 50%. In Spain this
austerity sparked the Indignados demonstrations that spread throughout the country and
into Portugal (Castells 2012). Research among Spains Indignados suggested that they
were developing new ways of practising politics. They were not interested in joining or
forming political parties or even voting in elections. Some claimed that the process is the
product, meaning that the demonstrations were ends in themselves. This was the position
of many participants in Britains student and anti-nuclear movements in the 1960s. Frank
Parkin (1968) described them as engaging in expressive politics. However, the
ambitions of many who took part in the Indignados movement were different insofar
as they aspired towards and could conceive of alternative ways of doing politics. Their
preferred ways of participating were via interactive websites and at mass meetings
which worked towards a consensus. Some were also involved in pioneering alternative
economic practices (Conill et al. 2012).
It was the same in the Occupy movement that erupted when the Indignados
demonstrations were fizzling-out in the Autumn of 2011. The first Occupy event was
Occupy Wall Street whose camp in Zuccotti Park commenced on 17 September 2011.
By the end of October, there were Occupy demonstrations in 95 cities in 82 countries, and
in over 600 communities across the USA. The Occupy slogan was, We are the 99
percent. By the end of 2011, this series of events was drawing to a close. Research
among Indignados and Occupy demonstrators (Castells 2012) and also among
participants in the events in Tunisia that sparked the Arab Spring (Honwana 2013)
produced similar findings as regards the motivations and behaviour of the young
protesters.
Low turnout at elections and miniscule political party membership figures in Western
countries should not be read as signs of young peoples political apathy. Rather, as in
Eastern Europe since 1989 and as context for the subsequent colour revolutions,
indignation and outrage can be there all the time before suddenly erupting in short-lived
outbursts of protest (Benedicto 2008). Inactive youth may be radically unpolitical
(disenchanted with all politicians and lacking confidence in existing political processes)
rather than apolitical (McDowell, Rootham, and Hardgrove 2013).
Conclusions and questions

There are several conclusions that can be drawn from a survey of past youth movements
which appear, so far, to be confirmed by the course of mobilisations in former communist
countries, the events in the Arab Spring and the series of protest movements in Western
countries that have been linked by their opposition to neo-liberalism
These movements are most successful in mobilising dissent, anger, despair and
outrage while they have no clear aims or leaders. This has applied in all the present
movements reviewed above.
Incumbent regimes can face down prolonged and massive youth protests for as long
as they retain the support of their armed forces. Eventually, the crowds of protesters
dwindle. Presidents and monarchs are toppled only when their security melts away as has
happened in Eastern Europe in 1989, in all the successful colour revolutions and in
Tunisia and Egypt during the Arab Spring.
Elections can be short-term disasters for youth protest movements. Once parties are
formed, leaders elected and policies declared, protesters tend to fragment while others
return to the party of the couch. On election day, another faction of the couch party is
likely to emerge, and then protesters find that they do not represent all or even most of
their people. The Arab countries have a specific problem. Elections are most likely to be
won by Islamic parties moderate Islamic parties but any Islamic government is
unacceptable to most of the countries armies and to secular voters of all ages whose
bottom line is separation of religion and government.
Up to now there have been no global youth movements. This is despite some
necessary pre-conditions having arisen the Internet which can host virtual global
communities, and the instant global transmission of sound and images so that, for
example 9/11 is now etched into the memories of people in countries all over the world
(Edmunds and Turner 2005). It is also despite the scale of present-day youth migration,
some permanent but in other cases by young people who intend to return home after
completing courses or after earning and saving money, which means that local youth
scenes and cultures are often cosmopolitan (Beck and Beck-Gernsheim 2009). The
revolutions in 1989, the colour revolutions, the Indignados, Occupy and the Arab
Spring have all been concentrated within if not confined to specific groups of countries.
Successful protest movements that have toppled governments need to be set in
context. Many governing regimes have held onto power throughout long periods and
have seen-off the formation of successive political generations and associated youth
movements. The Alouite monarchy has ruled Morocco since 1666 though with far less
power today than in 1666. Russias political elite has held power since the time of Lenin.
Splits and power transfers have been within the elite. There have been no revolutions
from below, and President Putins young supporters vastly outnumber the more visible
opposition which tends to be concentrated in major cities and comprises mainly highly
964 K. Roberts
educated young people from intelligentsia families (Lyytikinen 2013). There are Central
Asia countries whose communist leaders in Soviet times became their independent
countries first presidents and still hold office (Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan).
Modern dynasties are being created. Heydar Aliyev became president of Azerbaijan in
1993 (he was formerly part of the communist elite) and was succeeded by son Ilham in
2003. Hafez al-Assad became president of Syria in 1971 and was followed by son Bashar
in 2000.
Also, older-type adult-led youth organisations are still active. Major political parties
have youth sections. Cohort replacement in political elites can happen without a new
political generation being formed. Many governments run schemes that recruit young
people for voluntary service at home and abroad. The EU and the Council of Europe
always have projects which aim to draw the continents youth together in citizenship-
building projects (Kovacheva 2000b; Loncle et al. 2012). It may be decades before post-
communist youth, the activists during the Arab Spring of 2011, and the young people in
the West who seek alternatives to neo-liberalism, become genuine change generations.
Another possibility is that this will never happen.
As well as conclusions, there are several questions posed by the preceding review of
past and present youth mobilisations which can be debated but not answered conclusively
at present.
. Whether recent youth mobilisations have been pioneering new ways of practising
politics, or whether they are just immature political generations, or simply protests.
. What difference, if any, have the new media made? The new media may be able to
accelerate the spread of protests, but 1989 happened with underground printed
media.
. Whether the post-1970s mobilisations that are (maybe misleading) usually labelled
far right, which have benefited from the loss of support by the major political
parties in most European countries, are revivals of old or factions of potential new
political generations.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
References
Baev, P. K. 2011. A Matrix for Post-Soviet Color Revolutions: Exorcising the Devil from the
Details. International Area Studies Review 14 (2): 322. doi:10.1177/223386591101400201.
Beachain, D. O., and A. Polese. 2010. Rocking the Vote: New Forms of Youth Organisations in
Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union. Journal of Youth Studies 13: 615630. doi:10.1080/
13676261.2010.487523.
Beck, U., and E. Beck-Gernsheim. 2008. Global Generations and the Trap of Methodological
Nationalism for a Cosmopolitan Turn in the Sociology of Youth and Generation. European
Sociological Review 25 (1): 2536. doi:10.1093/esr/jcn032.
Bell, B., A. Bindler, and S. Machin. 2014. Recessions and the Making of Career Criminals.
London: Centre for Economic Performance, London School of Economics. CEP Discussion
Paper 1284.
Benedicto, J. 2008, June. Young People and Politics: Disconnected, Sceptical, an Alternative, or
All of It at the Same Time? In Young People and Political Participation: European Research,
Young Peoples Studies Magazine, edited by J. Benedicto and A. L. Blasco, 1317. Madrid,
Spain: Observatory of Youth in Spain.
Blackstone, T., K. Gales, R. Hadley, and W. Lewis. 1970. Students in Conflict: LSE in 1967.
London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
Bunce, V., and S. Wolchik. 2006. Youth and Electoral Revolutions in Slovakia, Serbia and
Georgia. SAIS Review 26 (2): 5565. doi:10.1353/sais.2006.0028.
Burnett, J. 2000. Time for a Change: A Contribution to the Sociology of Generations. Paper
presented at British Sociological Association Conference, York.
Castells, M. 2012. Networks of Outrage and Hope: Social Movements in the Internet Age.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Clark, T., and A. Heath. 2014. Hard Times: The Divisive Toll of the Economic Slump. Cambridge,
MA: Yale University Press.
Collin, M. 2007. The Time of the Rebels: Youth Resistance Movements and 21st Century
Revolutions. London: Serpents Tail.
Conill, J., M. Castells, A. Cardenas, and L. Servon. 2012. Beyond the Crisis: The Emergence of
Alternative Economic Practices. In Aftermath: The Cultures of the Economic Crisis, edited by
M. Castells, J. Caraca, and G. Cardoso, 210248. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Edmunds, J., and B. S.Turner. 2005. Global Generations: Social Change in the Twentieth
Century. British Journal of Sociology 56: 559577. doi:10.1111/j.1468-4446.2005.00083.x.
Eisenstadt, S. N. 1964. From Generation to Generation. New York: Free Press.

Fendrich, J. M. 1977. Keeping the Faith or Pursuing the Good Life. American Sociological
Review 42 (1): 144157. doi:10.2307/2117736.
Ferge, Z. 1997. The Changed Welfare Paradigm The Individualization of the Social. Social
Policy and Administration 31 (1): 2044. doi:10.1111/1467-9515.00035.
Feuer, L. 1968. The Conflict of Generations. London: Heinemann.
France, A., and S. Roberts. 2015. The Problem of Social Generations: A Critique of the New Emerging
Orthodoxy in Youth Studies. Journal of Youth Studies 18: 215230. doi:10.1080.13676261.2014.
944122.
Hansen, K. T. 2008. Introduction: Youth and the City. In Youth and the City in the Global South,
edited by K. T. Hansen and A. L. Dalsgaard, 323. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Honwana, A. 2013. Youth and Revolution in Tunisia. London: Zed Books.
Inglehart, R. 1977. The Silent Revolution. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
International IDEA. 2004. Voter Turnout in Western Europe since 1945. Stockholm: International
Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.
Kovacheva, S. 1995. Student Political Culture in Transition: The Case of Bulgaria. In The Puzzle
of Integration. European Yearbook on Youth Policy and Research, 1, edited by CYRCE,
105124. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
Kovacheva, S. 2000a. Sinking or Swimming in the Waves of Transformation. Young people and
Social Protection in Eastern Europe. Brussels: European Youth Forum.
Kovacheva, S. 2000b. Keys to Youth Participation in Eastern Europe. Strasbourg: Council of
Europe.
Leccardi, C., and C. Feixa. 2010. The Concept of Generation in Youth Theories. Revista de
Pedagogie 58: 721.
Lian, H. 2014. The Post-1980s Generation in China: Exploring Its Theoretical Underpinning.
Journal of Youth Studies 17: 965981. doi:10.1080/13676261.2013.878786.
Lomax, B. 1997. The Strange Death of Civil Society in Post-communist Hungary. Journal of
Communist Studies and Transition Politics 13 (1): 4163. doi:10.1080/13523279708415331.
Loncle, P., M. Cuconato, V. Muniglia, and A. Walther, eds.2012. Youth Participation in Europe.
Bristol: Polity Press.
Lyytikinen, L. 2013. Gendered and Classed Activist Identity in the Russian Oppositional Youth
Movement. Sociological Review 61: 499524. doi:10.1111/1467-954X.12063.
Mannheim, K. 1928 [1952]. The Problem of Generations. In Essays on the Sociology of
Knowledge. London: Routledge.
Mannheim, K. 1936. Ideology and Utopia: An Introduction to the Sociology of Knowledge.
London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Mannheim, K., and W. A. C. Stewart. 1962. An Introduction to the Sociology of Education.
London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
966 K. Roberts
McDowell, L., E. Rootham, and A. E. Hardgrove. 2013. Politics, Anti-politics, Quiescence and
Radical Unpolitics: Young Men's Political Participation in an Ordinary English Town. Journal
of Youth Studies 17 (1): 4262. doi:10.1080/13676261.2013.825709.
Mierina, I. 2014. The Vicious Circle. Does Disappointment with Political Authorities Contribute to
Political Passivity in Latvia? European Societies 16: 615637. doi:10.1080/14616696.2012.
749414.
Mihailov, D., ed. 2005. Civil Society without Citizens. Sofia: CIVICUS.
Mitev, P. E., ed. 1998. The Bulgarian Transition: Challenges and Cognition. Sofia: LIK.
Mitev, P. E., ed. 2005. The New Young: Bulgarian Youth and the European Perspective. Sofia:
East-West.
Muna, W. K., A. Stanton, and D. M. Mwau. 2014. Deconstructing Intergenerational Politics
between Young Turks and Old Guards in Africa: An Exploration of the Perceptions on
Leadership and Governance in Kenya. Journal of Youth Studies17: 13781394. doi:10.1080/
13676261.2014.918248.
Niznik, J., and E. Skotnicka-Illasiewicz. 1992. What Is Europe for Young Poles? International
Journal of Sociology 22: 5069.
Noueihed, L., and A. Warren. 2013. The Battle for the Arab Spring: Revolution, Counter-
Revolution and the Making of a New Era. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Ortega y Gasset, J. 1930 [1932]. The Revolt of the Masses. London: Allen and Unwin.
Osman, T. 2013. Egypt on the Brink: From Nasser to the Moslem Brotherhood. New Haven: Yale
University Press.
Parkin, F. 1968. Middle Class Radicalism. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Pilkington, H. 1994. Russias Youth and Its Culture. London: Routledge.
Reich, C. A. 1972. The Greening of America. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Roberts, K. (2009). Youth in Transition: Eastern Europe and the West. Basingstoke: Palgrave
Macmillan.
Roberts, K. 2012a. 1989: So Hard to Remember and So Easy to Forget. In 1989 Young People
and Social Change after the Fall of the Berlin Wall, edited by C. Leccardi, C. Feixa,
S. Kovacheva, H. Reiter, and T. Sekulic. Strasbourg: Council of Europe.
Roberts, K. 2012b. The End of the Long Baby-boomer Generation. Journal of Youth Studies
15: 479497. doi:10.1080/13676261.2012.663900.
Roberts, K., S. C. Clark, C. Fagan, and J. Tholen. 2000. Surviving Post-Communism: Young People
in the Former Soviet Union. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
Roberts, K., I. Predborska, and K. Ivaschenko. 2004. Youth Transitions in East and West Ukraine.
European Sociological Review 20: 403413. doi:10.1093/esr/jch034.
Rose, R., and I. McAllister. 1990. The Loyalties of Voters. London: Sage.
Roszak, T. 1970. The Making of a Counter Culture. London: Faber.
Schuman, H., and A. G. Corning. 2000. Collective Knowledge of Public Events: The Soviet Era
from the Great Purge to Glasnost. American Journal of Sociology 105: 913956. doi:10.1086/
210396.
Shahine, S. H. 2011. Youth and the Revolution in Egypt (Respond to this article at http://www.
therai.org.uk/at/debate). Anthropology Today 27 (2): 13. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8322.2011.00792.x.
Vanderwalle, D. 2012. A History of Modern Libya. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Zhuk, S. I. 2010. Rock and Roll in the Rocket City: The West, Identity and Ideology in Soviet
Dneipropetrovsk. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press.

Arab Spring - Youth's Political Engagement PDF

Enviado por

Dados do documento

Título original

Direitos autorais

Formatos disponíveis

Compartilhar este documento

Compartilhar ou incorporar documento

Opções de compartilhamento

Você considera este documento útil?

Este conteúdo é inapropriado?

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

Arab Spring - Youth's Political Engagement PDF

Enviado por

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

Journal of Youth Studies

ISSN: 1367-6261 (Print) 1469-9680 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cjys20

Youth mobilisations and political generations:

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2015.1020937

Published online: 13 Mar 2015.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 862

View related articles

View Crossmark data

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at

Download by: [113.190.155.191] Date: 30 September 2015, At: 11:22

Youth mobilisations and political generations: young activists in

Department of Sociology, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

Student movements in the 1960s

Anti-colonial and neo-colonial movements

Revolutions in Eastern Europe

Retrospect and prospect

The colour revolutions and other mobilisations in ex-communist countries

The Arab Spring

demonstration was at an IMF/WB meeting in Berlin in 1988. This was followed by a

Conclusions and questions

Eisenstadt, S. N. 1964. From Generation to Generation. New York: Free Press.

Você também pode gostar