“The discourse on young people’s mental health prevents us from considering the structural dimensions of the crises they are experiencing.”

The mental health of young people has been omnipresent in public debate for several days. The murder of a supervisor by a middle school student in Nogent (Haute-Marne) on June 10th, according to many politicians, is a reflection of "psychological problems" (Elisabeth Borne), implying "looking after the mental health" of young people (Jean-Luc Mélenchon), a reality that must be "faced" (Marine Le Pen). This cross-party unanimity in seeing mental health as a possible explanation for this tragic event is the culmination of a long process of putting this issue on the political agenda.

After a relative indifference of the public authorities to the psychological situation of young people during the first lockdown linked to the Covid-19 epidemic, the establishment of a series of epidemiological and sociological proofs of the deterioration of the psychological state of the youngest led to a series of measures: implementation of "psychological checks" in 2021, a listening platform for students in 2024, and, now, mental health established as a "major national cause" .

Our research on the mental health of young people (see issue 97 of the journal Agora Débats/Jeunesses ) leads us to broaden the focus to draw some initial avenues of analysis concerning the social and political treatment of young people whose psychological state is under scrutiny, with solutions that often appear to be a plaster on a wooden leg, given the issues identified by the research.

We readily speak of a youth in crisis, prey to violence, disrupted by early and unlimited access to social networks. This crisis is amplified by other crises (the Covid-19 crisis, the social crisis, or even the climate crisis), and casts young people as the designated victims of transformations described as harmful to social ties, the economy, or the planet. This combination of structural crises is subsumed under the unanimous observation of a deteriorating psychological situation among young people.

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