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The aim of this contribution is to analyze the work experiences of 50 precarious young people, interviewed in a city of Northern Italy, Turin, and in a city of the South, Catania. The subjective points of view, the definitions, the perceptions and the strategies of the interviewees are investigated in relation to the transition to adulthood, phase of the life course (Elder 1995) that they are experiencing in a historical period and in societies marked by work precariousness as a state of generalized and permanent insecurity (Bourdieu 1998), and paying attention to the role of the territorial context. How can living in Turin and Catania change the interpretation that the young individuals give of their own precariousness, the "navigation" strategies of it and the possible "exit strategies" and where instead transversal similarities between the young people interviewed in the two cities emerge? What dimensions do influence differences and transversality? The present paper explores these questions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents the main findings of an exploratory research focused on Fiat workers living on cassa integrazione (redundancy payment) in Turin. The large factory manual workers who are the subjects of in-depth interviews are unskilled or low-skilled older workers with permanent contracts and, at the same time, men with family responsibilities. Today these workers feel exposed to new risks of impoverishment and long-term unemployment, due to the economic crises, and perceive a great insecurity regarding their future. Cassa integrazione has serious economic consequences for family living conditions: the analysis reveals situations of suffering and economic deprivation. While sociological research has mostly focused on economic vulnerability resulting from atypical employment, this paper investigates experiences of vulnerability of the so-called «insiders» as well-protected workers, without a background of job changing, recurrent unemployment and short-terms contracts, and explores their coping strategies, thus pointing to the need for a renewed interest in the relationship between poverty and work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In current theoretical and policy debate concerning urban regeneration in Europe, the neighbourhood has re-emerged as an important setting. This paper addresses the theme of urban regeneration drawing on a research study about a specific «area and people-based» program, realized in two neighbourhoods in Turin. In these selected areas some estates, originally built to host athletes and journalists during the Olympic Winter Games (2006), were converted into social housing units meant to promote social mix among less and more well off inhabitants of the area. The aim of the study is to gain a better insight into the development and the outcome of the program. Evidence is offered from a survey on orientations and behaviours concerning social relationships in one of the two neighbourhoods, after two years from the intervention. The core question of the paper is whether the effect of cohesion and cooperation among people living in the same area, but belonging to different social classes, has taken place as expected. The paper explores factors and mechanisms explaining the partial failure of this social and urban experiment, focusing on the experience of daily inclusion/exclusion from a specific shared place. Concepts from institutional economy are introduced to enlighten the complexity of this experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]