Abstract

The increasing weight of youth unemployment in Europe once again has thrown the spotlight on to apprenticeship as a contractual tool with a strong educational power which can smooth the school-to-work transition for young people. However, dual systems’ability to match labour demand and supply has been severely threatened by global megatrends, such as: outsourcing, globalization, technical innovation, and demographic changes, which over the last 50 years have been affecting economies, labour markets and education and training systems as well. European countries have reacted to these changes by activating policies that had proven effective in strengthening the attractiveness of apprenticeship and the quality of vocational training. In the resultant transformation, dual systems’ capacity to promote the social inclusion of disadvantaged young people seems to be reducing. The analysis of the evolutionary trajectories of German, Austrian, Swiss and French dual systems can provide some hints for setting up the ‘Italian way to the dual system’.