ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book focuses on the analysis carried out in the framework of the SAHWA Project funded by the European Commission under the Seventh Framework Programme. It shows the strategies undertaken by young Moroccans to turn their “marginalized” positions in society into entrepreneurial ventures. The book demonstrates that youth in Egypt constitute many groups that lack coordination and political machinery to rank youth priorities and coordinate behavioural strategies. It discusses how unequal access to quality education led to social reproduction, limited the chances for social mobility and deepened the marginalisation of the youth. The book explores the Euro-Med Youth Programme, a specific scheme directly and exclusively targeting young people in the Arab Mediterranean countries, under the policy evaluation framework. It summarizes social opportunities and spaces in which young Arabs can establish and manage their own alternative contemporaneities.
