Socioeducational Policies to Young People in Peripheral Areas: International Trends and the Portuguese Case

<jats:p>This chapter discusses main international trends in public policies towards young people in peripheral areas, taking Portugal as a case study. This analysis departs from Esping Andersen’s framework on the Welfare State in different regions, focusing on the specific case of Southern Europe. The complex support/control apparatus over poor families and young people and especially the increasing importance of moral concerns, public perceptions and the risk approach in the public programmes are discussed. Specific forms of state intervention in peripheral territories are addressed according to recent research in urban and marginality studies, including the spread of new technologies of surveillance, repression and control, but also strategies of allocating social resources to gentrification processes lead by private interests. Finally, this chapter reflects upon the growing dominance of a rhetoric of empowerment, entrepreneurship and self-responsibility on socioeducational policies. Such trends are sketched according to international research in this field, exploring how they are being appropriated in Portugal, especially by the two main national programmes to integrate young people from peripheral areas, one focused on schools (TEIP) and the other on local youth projects (Escolhas). The ultimate argument is that such policies are not able to tackle structural factors constraining young people’s lives in peripheral territories, such as exploitation and exclusion, but they are appropriated by social actors, in different scales, to pursue a wide variety of goals.</jats:p>