Merit-based competitions for entry into the Colombian administrative career: an obstacle to youth transitions into the labour context

The Social State of Law, currently in force in Colombia, mandates that all individuals should be able to fully exercise their rights beyond mere formal written provisions. To this end, various strategies have been structured to contribute to personal, familial, and socio-economic development, among...

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Autor principal: Perilla Granados, Juan Sebastián Alejandro
Formato: Artículo revista
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: Universidad Nacional del Litoral 2025
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Acceso en línea:https://bibliotecavirtual.unl.edu.ar/publicaciones/index.php/index/article/view/14238
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Sumario:The Social State of Law, currently in force in Colombia, mandates that all individuals should be able to fully exercise their rights beyond mere formal written provisions. To this end, various strategies have been structured to contribute to personal, familial, and socio-economic development, among others. One of these strategies focuses on opportunities for access to public employment, through merit-based public competitions that enable the filling of positions within the administrative career. However, these competitions apply a uniform approach without a differential perspective for both young adults and adults. Therefore, the present article sets forth the following general research objective: to determine whether merit-based competitions for access to public employment within the Colombian State can be understood as an obstacle, rooted in natural variables such as age, to facilitate the current labour market transitions of young people. Grounded in a hermeneutic, socio-critical research approach, using qualitative methods that include documentary review, the study concludes that certain criteria employed to assess young adults in merit-based public competitions result in structural inequities that hinder youth labour transitions in the public sector context. Consequently, the article suggests strengthening strategies, including reasonable adjustments informed by differential approaches and the segmented application of merit based on age-related criteria.