RN30 - Youth & Generation

The RN30 Youth and Generation is a dynamic network of researchers interested in youth from a variety of angles. It was founded in Budapest in 1995, during the second ESA Conference, by French sociologist Jean-Charles Lagrée. Since then it has grown steadily and now counts over one hundred affiliates. Its purpose is to promote research in the field of youth and to provide the main forum for sociological advancement and debates in Europe in this area.

Active affiliates conduct research in this field either/both on empirical ground, using a wide breadth of methods; and/or theoretically diverse traditions such as cultural sociology and beyond. RN30 is an inclusive network and it welcomes affiliates at any stage of their careers, recognizing the epistemological issues involved in studying youth and the richness of insights that may derive.

RN30 has been very active organizing not only paper sessions at ESA biannual conferences, but also several well attended semi-plenary sessions at the same conferences. Since 2007, RN30 has organized successful midterm conferences. These are kept relatively small and normally focus on a specific substantive focus, keeping a specific format. Thus, RN30 overall provides outlets of different kinds for the discussion of youth issues.

A fil rouge of these events, spanning among several subtopics, has been to discuss how research on youth which is done nationally can be compared and contrasted internationally, and how to collaborate more broadly by constituting international research groups and other means of confrontation. Most notably, in recent years collaborations with ISA RC 34 Sociology of Youth have been established.