“To Be or Not To Be Married”: Marriage as Turning Point to Adulthood in Arab Mediterranean Countries

Several authors stress the significance in transitions to adulthood of three focuses: education, employment and political participation. This triple transition aftermath of the famous tripartite division of the life course: preparation for personal life, professional life, and citizenship. In AMC's, the delay in accessing social adulthood suffered by young Arabs consigns them to a liminal space in which they are neither children nor independent autonomous adults. In any case, for young people school-to work-transition is the main and decisive step, which very often shapes their whole life. Nevertheless, following diverse authors, marriage is the final objective to achieve social maturity influencing youth's decision making in AMC's. The findings of this paper emerge from a dialogue between qualitative and quantitative data collected during the period 2015- 2016 in the framework of SAHWA Project. Some questions emerge. What is the capability of Arab youths to decide about the orientation of their trajectories? Which are the factors (cultural, family, socioeconomic, educational, etc.) creating and shaping the expectations of young people about their transition from parental family to a family of their own? How do the changes in the transition to adulthood impact on the emergence of new cultural trends and values among Arab youths? And finally, how do young live the contradiction between current economic exclusion of youth and the cultural requirements to be considering an adult in the region?