Contemporary German Youth and Their Elders: A Generational Comparison

(Hardback)

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Systematic research on the changing experience and social and political characteristics of German youth has been carried out in the Federal Republic of Germany on an ongoing basis since the early 1950s. Until now, however, the results of these long-term studies have not been made available in English. Six volumes of this research--including new analyses prepared especially for this book--are distilled in the present work, which offers a comprehensive and focused portrait of German youth of succeeding postwar generations from 1953 to the present. Following an introductory survey of the scope and themes addressed in the study, the authors highlight the contrasting experiences of youth of the 1980s and those who came of age soon after the end of World War II. They examine the fundamental constituents of youth as a developmental period, with particular reference to changes in the recent era. Attitudinal scales are developed and applied to assessments of variations in social and political orientation among generations and between distinct subgroups of contemporary youth. Differences between young women in the early postwar period and the alternative era of the 1970s and 1980s are explored. Focusing on views of the future, the final chapter looks at the diversity of lifestyles that has become characteristic of youth over the last decade and at the increasing differentiation between generations. Providng a wealth of new material on an important body of research, this book makes a substantial contribution to the study of youth in advanced industrialized nations. An appropriate resource for courses or studies in various disciplines in sociology, geography, political science, and social history.

Reviews

. . . It is a premise of this study that the protest generation of the 1960s and the "alternative generation" following in its footsteps have set the tone for the youth culture of teh 1980s. . . . The premise suggests a major rupture in the socialization process of German youth and dramatizes the generational conflict that may exist. It also portrays the young generation as far more cohesive than even the data presented suggest. . . .-Perspectives on Political Science
A wide-ranging portrait of German youth of succeeding postwar generations from 1953 to the present is offered in this text, which is based on previously unavailable systematic research dealing with the changing experience and social and political characteristics of German youth. The fundamental constituents of youth as a developmental period are probed, with special reference to changes in the recent era. Attitudinal scales are developed and applied to assessments of variations in social and political orientation among generations and between distinct subgroups of contemporary youth. Differences between young women in the early postwar period and the "alternative era" of the 1970s and 1980s are investigated. Specific sections deal with such subjects as autobiographical attempts to deal with the past; images of the self in the social world; youth centrism and relationships between generations; models of social orientation; how young people feel about the future; and the constrastive politics of optimism and pessimism.-Sage Family Studies Abstracts
." . . It is a premise of this study that the protest generation of the 1960s and the "alternative generation" following in its footsteps have set the tone for the youth culture of teh 1980s. . . . The premise suggests a major rupture in the socialization process of German youth and dramatizes the generational conflict that may exist. It also portrays the young generation as far more cohesive than even the data presented suggest. . . ."-Perspectives on Political Science
"A wide-ranging portrait of German youth of succeeding postwar generations from 1953 to the present is offered in this text, which is based on previously unavailable systematic research dealing with the changing experience and social and political characteristics of German youth. The fundamental constituents of youth as a developmental period are probed, with special reference to changes in the recent era. Attitudinal scales are developed and applied to assessments of variations in social and political orientation among generations and between distinct subgroups of contemporary youth. Differences between young women in the early postwar period and the "alternative era" of the 1970s and 1980s are investigated. Specific sections deal with such subjects as autobiographical attempts to deal with the past; images of the self in the social world; youth centrism and relationships between generations; models of social orientation; how young people feel about the future; and the constrastive politics of optimism and pessimism."-Sage Family Studies Abstracts

Author Bio

MEREDITH W. WATTS is Professor of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He edited Biopolitics: Ethological and Physiological Approaches and Biopolitics and Gender, and his articles have appeared in American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Social Science Quarterly, and other scholarly publications. ARTHUR FISCHER is a Psychologist and serves as Director of the Psydata Institute of Market, Social and Media Research of Frankfurt (Federal Republic of Germany). He is coauthor of Youth '81 (Jugend '81) and Youth and Adults '85 (Jugendliche and Erwachsene '85). WERNER FUCHS is Professor of Sociology and Education at the University of Hagen (Federal Republic of Germany). He is coauthor of Youth '81 and Youth and Adults '85. He has published widely in Germany on biographical studies of youth and is currently directing a major research project that examines the life-course development of contemporary youth in Germany. JURGEN ZINNECKER is Professor of Education at the University of Siegen (Federal Republic of Germany), specializing in the sociology of youth. He is coauthor of Youth '81 and Youth and Adults '85 and author of the recent book Jugendkultur which deals with the development of German youth culture from 1945 to the present.