Much of the discussion and workshop dialogue was relevant to the work the Pathways through Participation project is exploring. Mike Locke, Director of Public Affairs for Volunteering England raised important questions regarding participation and life stages; do new citizenship programmes lead to lifelong participatory habits? Will changes in older people’s lifestyles and work patterns affect individual participation? The nebulous concept of volunteering was a recurring talking point throughout; is helping a neighbour to clear snow ‘volunteering’? Is engaging in decision making mechanisms a form of ‘volunteering’? Does one form of volunteering lead to another? All key issues the Pathways project is grappling with.

Tom Leftwich, policy advisor for the Office for Civil Society outlined the government’s take on participation in the Big Society. He spoke of the importance of engaging young adults with programmes such as the National Citizen Service for 16 year olds, and how essential it is to explore the barriers to participation such as bureaucracy and red tape, and remove such blocks. On the Wednesday I spoke to delegates from Siegen and Lille about the Pathways through Participation project and the barriers to participation. I was fascinated to hear how similar barriers and blocks tend to be beyond the UK. However it was interesting to hear about the importance of ‘project based’ participation particularly in Siegen in Germany. A local community development, for example the laying of a new football pitch, can often become a real hub for participation, bringing together local residents and which can lead to progressive individual participation (e.g. laying the pitch, playing on the pitch, coaching on the pitch). I was struck by how natural it is for people to participate, especially in rural Germany where there might be less amenities and leisure activities. Children grow up surrounded by participants and a sense of mutual-aid, and it becomes a social norm as they grow into their adult life. I was told of the saying in some German areas, “everyone here has started a club”.

To find out more about the European Year of Volunteering, including individual stories and a campaign toolbox, visit http://europa.eu/volunteering/

Research shows that people’s volunteering behaviors change over the life cycle. Young people might volunteer as means of improving their CV.  Newly married couples decrease their volunteering in the face of the adjustment to married life.  As couples begin to have children and invest in family life, their involvement shifts to be more involved in schools, youth organisations and religious communities.  In their more mature years, people might increase their volunteering hours as they retire from their jobs. But as old age and declining health interfere, volunteering tapers off. In addition to the effect of the life cycle on volunteering, the paper looks at how certain life events can also influence volunteering, including the birth of a child, getting divorced or being widowed.

The full paper can be found here.

Using a narrative approach allows researchers to explore how people make meaning of experience, how experience and meaning are shaped by context, and how people’s identities may be constructed by the stories they tell about themselves and their world. In the Pathways project, our interest in people’s stories about their experience of participation over their life times makes a narrative approach to data collection and analysis very appropriate. Traditionally, narrative has been associated with qualitative research, but the workshop leader, Professor Jane Elliot, explained that narrative is equally relevant in quantitative research – numbers ‘tell a story.’

Interestingly, the Centre for Longitudinal Studies is currently engaged in a piece of research focusing on social participation amongst a sub-sample of 1958 cohort members.  One of its aims is to try to understand why some members are more socially engaged than others. The Pathways team will certainly be following this research as it progresses.

Some commentators and academics (Robert Putnam amongst them) have proposed that the difference in participation levels between different age groups is less to do with people’s age and more to do with which generation they belong to. The argument (simply put) goes that Baby Boomers (born 1946 – 1964) are the great moral and ‘civic’ generation; with Generation X (born 1965 – 1981) being cynical, individualistic and ‘low participators’, whilst the Millennials (born 1982 – 1998) have a deep commitment to community and helping others, and they put their beliefs into action.

Pete Peterson challenges such stereotypes and, using data from the latest (US) Civic Health Index, argues that Generation X-ers not only volunteer more than Baby Boomers and ‘retired seniors’, but had increased their participation in the last year compared to Millennials, Boomers and Seniors. One of the reasons why Generation X-ers are currently derided and Millennials applauded is, Peterson suggests, because of their respective political leanings, with Millennials overwhelmingly self-identifying as Democrats (52%) compared to Republicans (30%). He warns, however, that Millennials also display a strong libertarian streak, and express support for fiscally conservative policies. He concludes that ‘while pundits keep handing out participation trophies to the Millennials, maybe this year they should save a few for the enlightened sceptics of Generation X.’

Whilst we won’t be handing out any trophies on the Pathways project, we will be looking at the influence of life stage and age on people’s participation, as well as a host of other factors! 

For the full article, and some useful references go to: http://www.newgeography.com/content/001374-get-real-aout-generation-x-stereotypes