First published in 1998

This is Volume IX of the fifteen in the Sociology of Gender and the Family series and explores age groups and social structure from generation to generation.

The purpose of this book is to analyze the various social phenomena known as age groups, youth movements, etc., and to ascertain whether it is possible to specify the social conditions under which they arise or the types of societies in which they occur.

It is the main thesis of this book that the existence of these groups is not fortuitous or random, and that they arise and exist only under very specific social conditions.

The authors have also attempted to show that the analysis of these conditions is not only of purely antiquarian or ethnological interest, but that it can also shed light on the understanding of the conditions of stability and continuity of social systems.