The Social and Spatial Exclusion of Young People in Small Cities Outat AL-Hajj as a Model

Abstract

This study concerns social exclusion, from which the poor and the marginalized suffer, especially the youth, as they are considered the backbone of development. The survey has been based on questionnaires and a quantity approach so that we could track the factual factors behind the spatial as well as social exclusion of the community as well as youths, considering indicators related to housing, the nature of the neighborhoods, and the accessibility to public services. The sample of the questionnaires targeted eighty (80) families selected randomly between 2019 and 2021. The statistical tendency followed in this study has imposed the use of a questionnaire as an instrument to ensure the predictability of the phenomenon if the relational and objective conditions have been mastered. So, our study has concluded that material poverty affects the youth group intensively. This fact leads to partial paralysis, if not total, of their social and family life and, as a result, to their social exclusion. For example, the absence of housing that lacks the primary conditions of dignity and comfort contributes to social exclusion because housing is the first key identity of youths and their families. The infrastructure of housing is also one of the indicators of social exclusion. Housing lacking sewage, electricity, drinkable water, and a phone network, especially in the twenty-first century, is considered a vital source of social exclusion. Therefore, the nature of the housing and the neighborhood creates a particular culture for the dwellers of that place. The study results in a set of recommendations that can be summarized as follows: job opportunities, public services, youth development, and environmental spaces.