How Young People Navigate Everyday Insecurity Across the World
Dr Mosa Phadi from Stellenbosch University and Professor Ana Aliverti from the University of Warwick are leading a major international project that explores how young people living in disadvantaged urban areas keep themselves safe in their everyday lives. Their work focuses on communities where poverty, unequal access to services and heavy policing shape daily experiences, yet where young people still find creative ways to navigate danger, build support networks and maintain a sense of security.
Across countries such as Argentina, England, South Africa, El Salvador, Uruguay, Denmark and the Netherlands, young people in marginalised neighbourhoods face a complex reality. They often experience some of the highest levels of crime and victimisation, yet they also face frequent police surveillance and punishment. This means they live in a constant tension where the state can feel both protective and threatening at the same time. Despite this, these young people develop their own strategies to cope with insecurity. They rely on friends, neighbours, community leaders and sometimes even on people involved in criminal groups. These relationships can involve care, cooperation, avoidance or resistance depending on the circumstances.
Dr Phadi and Professor Aliverti’s project investigates these everyday strategies and the different forms of social regulation that exist alongside or outside state institutions. Their team draws on criminology, anthropology, sociology and law to understand how young people make decisions in dangerous environments and how they work with or around official systems. The project challenges the common idea that security is something only provided by the state. Instead, it shows that security is shaped through relationships, informal practices and community responses, which vary across the Global South and the Global North.
The research uses multi‑sited ethnography, meaning that researchers spend time in several communities across different countries to observe real life experiences from the ground up. This global approach helps uncover similarities and differences in how young people manage insecurity in very different social, political and economic contexts. It also helps avoid assumptions that are based only on the experiences of wealthier northern countries, which often dominate academic discussions about policing and safety.
The project is expected to have important policy relevance. Around the world, governments have introduced approaches such as community policing or safe cities initiatives. However, these programmes often fail because they are not designed with the involvement of the people most affected by insecurity. By focusing on the voices and experiences of young people themselves, this research can help shape security strategies that are more democratic, more inclusive and more sensitive to local communities.
This collaboration between Stellenbosch and Warwick brings together a network of experts from Latin America, Africa and Europe. It supports early career researchers and strengthens international leadership in the study of urban security, social justice and youth experiences. For both institutions, the project aligns with core commitments to interdisciplinarity, social impact and global engagement.
Through this work, Dr Phadi and Professor Aliverti aim to rethink how societies understand security and to help build approaches that promote dignity, inclusion and wellbeing for young people living on the urban margins.