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Abstract
Against the backdrop of social, economic, and demographic changes of recent times, Arnett has proposed his theory of ‘emerging adulthood’, essentially a new stage of the life-course between adolescence and adulthood. Arnett sees emerging adulthood as a distinct, historically unprecedented period demographically, subjectively, and in terms of identity explorations. Furthermore, he claims that this time typically involves independence and represents the ‘apex of freedom’ in young people's lives where they ‘have more freedom to decide for themselves how to live than they have ever before or will ever have again’.
In this article, we expand on existing critique aimed at Arnett's concept, in particular with respect to his understanding of emerging adulthood as the ‘apex of freedom’. To exemplify the limits of Arnett's theory, we use Nikolas Rose's theorisation around governance through freedom and apply it to qualitative research material about the working holiday phenomenon in New Zealand – an essential element of emerging adulthood, which, superficially, seems to offer unlimited options for self-exploration, choice, and freedom. Rose's approach, however, illustrates that freedom and constraint are intertwined and that as emerging adults in New Zealand insert themselves into OE discourses, they are governed through freedom.
Notes
1. In some ways, the New Zealand OE is equivalent to the British ‘gap year’. The gap year is a prolonged period of time that an increasing number of young Britons spend either in the UK or abroad, combining a wide range of activities such as paid and unpaid/volunteering work, leisure, or travel (Jones 2004, Heath 2007). Exact numbers of how many young adults annually take a gap year do not exist. Existing literature and steadily rising numbers of those taking a gap year suggest, however, that it is becoming increasingly popular (Manzoor 2004, Simpson Citation2005).
2. Apart from one participant of Maori descent, all interviewees were non-Maori New Zealanders.
3. The blog description indicated its research purpose as well as the anonymity of comments. It also mentioned that as the blog was a public forum, any information provided could be accessed by other people. Thus, while the comments were anonymous through the possibility of choosing a pseudonym, confidentiality could not be guaranteed.
4. There are, however, also significant differences between these two phenomena. For instance, while gap years are predominantly taken after completing schooling, the OE can occur at this time, but also at other times in early adulthood. Further, the gap year is associated with an almost compulsory element of voluntary work (Simpson 2005). Yet, these differences are not relevant in the context of this article.
5. In the recruitment process, the CPIT students approached articulated that they were not planning on doing an OE and explicitly distinguished themselves from university students. Moreover, their talk suggested that they had taken up subject positions for whom the OE is not available. By underlining their position as CPIT students, they indicated that their constitution of non-OE travellers may be related to the differences between students who choose different forms of tertiary education.
6. Working holiday agreements are crucial for many young New Zealanders planning to go away for their OE. They enable them to travel to participating countries and take up paid employment for up to one year without having to apply for a specific work visa.