Claudine Attias-Donfut is a sociologist. Honorary director of research at the Caisse nationale d’assurance vieillesse [French National Old-Age Insurance Fund], she is an acknowledged specialist in intergenerational relationships. Martine Segalen is a sociologist and anthropologist. Emeritus professor at the Université Paris Nanterre, she has studied the institution of the family in its multiple dimensions; she has also conducted studies on contemporary rituals.
Between the young generation raised on everything digital and preceding generations an unprecedented break has developed, one that is perhaps more profound than the generation gap pointed out by Margaret Mead.
Born with the internet, these new young people form the first generation socialized in the digital age, the first horizontal generation, the first transnational generation, and the first ecological generation.
The challenges they will have to confront throughout their lives are immense: how will their values be shaped in the political arena? And how will this “pandemic generation” react following the looming economic and social crisis, of which they will be the primary victims? Finally, how can we understand the generational paradox that infuses it, since despite the gaps in values and ways of doing things, the bond within families continues to exercise its protective shielding?