Il sito del Laboratorio di Politiche Sociali

We are delight to highlight that Lara Maestripieri has published two new works.

One of the principle of Social Investment lies in the promotion of the educational level of the young, in the assumption that having more education will help in access more good jobs. But what happen when the good jobs are scarcely available for the deficiencies of the labour demand? This is the question behind the chapter The Social Investment challenge and young Italians, published in the book Italian Youth in International Context. Belonging, Constraints and Opportunities, Routledge 2019.

The chapter examines the situation of young workers in Italy, showing the incapacity of labour market to integrate them for the shortage of good jobs available in the Italian labour market. Taking into account two policies inspired by the principle of Social Investment (Youth Guarantee and Apprenticeship in Higher Education), it highlights how the failure of the measure is due more for a limited interest of the employers then for a lack of activation of policy target.

The pre-print version of the article is available on UAB DDD, from October 2022.

She also contributed to the newly published book of Alex Nicholls and Rafael Ziegler Creating Space for Social Innovation (Oxford University Press) with a chapter entitled Creating alternative economic spaces. The socially innovative practices of solidarity purchasing groups. The chapter includes an examination of the concept of solidarity and how it is put in practice by the activities of the Solidarity Purchasing Groups.

Starting from the theory of Tuomela and his classification of the various form of solidarity (I-perspective, I/We perspective, We perspective)in oprder to understand the practice of the groups, the chapter shows how social innovations as Solidarity Purchasing Groups only rarely involve in activities acknowledgeable fully as a We perspective solidarity. Their activities are, in fact, mostly favorable to their members or their primary networks.

The article is accessible in DDD UAB, starting from December 2021