Document Type

Article

Publication Date

8-2026

Department

Social Justice and Community Engagement

Abstract

This Major Research Paper examines how neoliberalism shapes the aspirations, self-perceptions and imagined futures of low-income and racialized youth in Canada. Drawing on Critical Political Economy, Postcolonial Theory, Critical Race Theory, and Intersectionality, the study uses a qualitative semi-systematic literature review and an autoethnographic lens to critically examine how neoliberal ideologies influence young people’s experiences. The findings suggest that neoliberalism not only produces material conditions of economic and social precarity but also individualizes structural inequality, encouraging youth to interpret systemic barriers as personal failures. These processes can constrain aspirations and contribute to an erosion of hope when pathways toward desired futures remain inaccessible. This MRP argues for understanding youth hope not simply as an individual psychological capacity, but as a socially and materially conditioned process shaped by broader structures of power and inequity.

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