Emotional Geopolitics and Everyday Security in Youth Contexts
Summary
Emotional geopolitics and everyday security in youth contexts examines how young people’s feelings, identities and aspirations intersect with political structures and security practices in daily life. Scholars have moved beyond state-centric approaches to consider the affective dimensions of geopolitics, foregrounding how emotions such as fear, hope or solidarity shape youth perceptions of risk and belonging. This field explores how young people negotiate fluid landscapes of threat and safety, drawing on concepts of ontological security to understand how they achieve a sense of continuity amid social, economic and environmental challenges. Research spans urban settings in both the Global North and South, relying on narrative methods, participatory role-play and ethnography to illuminate the cycles of insecurity that influence housing, mobility, digital interactions and political engagement. By emphasising the lived experience of security, this approach reveals interconnections between local practices—such as self-securitisation strategies—and broader geopolitical discourses on borders, nationalism and global risk. It underscores the agency of youth as critical and creative actors who articulate alternative political futures and demand inclusion in policymaking, education and recovery programmes. Comparative studies across Europe, Africa and Asia demonstrate how youth-led initiatives inform community resilience, educational reform and digital literacy programmes to counter rising insecurity.
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Emotional Geopolitics and Everyday Security in Youth Contexts publication trend
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Technical terms
Emotional geopolitics: The study of how emotions influence political relations across scales.
Everyday security: Individuals’ practices and perceptions of safety in routine life.
Ontological security: A stable sense of self and continuity in social environments.
Geopolitical imaginary: Conceptual and affective visions of political spaces and boundaries.
Self-securitisation: Strategies by which individuals safeguard their personal sense of security.
References
- Cycles of insecurities: Understanding the everyday politics of young Londoners. Cities (2022).
- Young people’s everyday securities: pre-emptive and pro-active strategies towards ontological security in Scotland. Social & Cultural Geography (2017).
- Simulating alternative internationals: Geopolitics role-playing in UK schools. Geoforum (2024).
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