5th ISA Forum of Sociology (6-11 July 2025)

Theories in the Sociology of Youth have largely been dominated by ideas from the Global North, although this is changing (Swartz et al., 2020). Recognising the global political economy of knowledge, is it possible to develop conceptual approaches attuned to the way that young people across the world are both increasingly diverse and unequal, while also connected by digital technology, new demands for education and the impact of global economic pressures? New connections do not mean that the lives young people are forging look the same across different groups and parts of the world. The world is arguably concurrently more interconnected and more plural (Chicchelli, 2018). This session invites presentations that ask how ideas and approaches developed in different contexts might (or might not) provide the foundations for a global dialogue among sociologists of youth about social change, new connections, divergences, power and inequality.