Transitions to Adulthood in Flux. Assessing Coming of Age through an Historical Lens in Finland and France
Transitions to Adulthood in Flux. Assessing Coming of Age through an Historical Lens in Finland and France

Summary/Abstract: According to youth experts, a significant number of contemporaryyoung people in Western societies reach adulthood at a later age than previousgenerations. This phenomenon is generally perceived as a temporary misstep on thepath todefaultpatterns of transition establishedin the 1950s and 1960s. Giventhecurrent societalcontext, should the transition to adulthood today really conform tothat model? This paper provides an historical analysis of transitionsto adulthood toenqui re whether the post-war model canstill be considered a meaningful referencetoday. Were routes of transition similar or different in earlier times, or hasthemodel always existed? To answer this question, the paper looks at demographicsin two case countries, Finland and France, in three periods: the nineteenth andearly twentieth centuries, the 1950s–1970s, and the early twenty-first century.The paper argues that the post-war generation’s rapid patterns of transitionw ere unique, resulting from a sustained period of economic growth in developedsocieties. Thishas generatednew pathways of transition and a model of adulthoodstill used as a standardpoint today, even though the current socio-economic contexthaschanged. Transitions to adulthood are not static. They have always evolved,mirroring the wider historicalcontext within which individuals operate.

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