Voice and Equality

Young People’s Politics in the European Union

Bibliographic Data

ID8041548
AuthorsJames Sloam (0000-0001-9369-2648, corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume36
Issue4
Pages836-858
Publication date2013-03-25
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueWest European Politics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0140-2382 • E-ISSN: 1743-9655
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/01402382.2012.749652
OpenAlexW2072368227
LanguageEN
Citations received42
References cited57

Academics and policy-makers have highlighted the increasing disconnection between citizens and electoral politics in Europe. Declining citizen involvement in traditional forms of politics has manifested itself in lower voter turnout and a dramatic shrinkage in the membership of political parties. Citizens have turned to alternative forms of civic and political engagement. These trends are most marked amongst young people. Whilst a number of studies have examined the nature of political participation in Europe, and the participation of young people in individual countries or specific political activities (such as voting), hardly any research has looked at patterns of engagement 'within' a generation of young people across different democracies. This article examines the political participation of young Europeans in national democracies in 15 European Union member states. Previous studies have shown that citizens are increasingly moving away from electoral forms of participation towards alternative forms of engagement that are (for the population as a whole) much less socially equal. Using data from the European Social Survey, this article finds that the social inequalities of participation are (with the major exception of voting) much less profound for young people. This latter finding has important implications for public efforts to promote greater youth participation in democracy. Notes 1. The far right scored several electoral successes in 2011 and 2012 alone in Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, the Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden. 2. Age has a major bearing on political participation (though this differs significantly by country and type of political activity), but the relationship is curvilinear (middle age groups tend to participate the most). As this article concentrates on young people rather than age in general, the analysis depicts the relationship between youth participation and overall participation in the EU15. 3. For reasons of space, the article focuses on young people's changing repertoires of participation rather than the agencies (e.g. issue groups), arenas (e.g. the Internet) and targets (e.g. national environmental policy) of their political engagement. 4. The new member states (post-2004) were not included in the study given the more significant differences in participatory practices and cultures: young 'respondents in the EU15 tend to be more involved (than those in the NMS12) in political life' (European Commission 2007 European Commission (2007). Young Europeans: Survey Among Young People Aged Between 15–30 in the European Union (Eurobarometer 202), European Commission, available at http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/flash/fl_202_sum_en.pdf (accessed 1 March 2012). [Google Scholar]: 40). 5. This article compares and contrasts citizens and young people in the top two and bottom two ESS categories of household income (on a 12-bracket scale). The numbers present in these groups are only a small fraction of the numbers present in the high-education and low-education categories (see Table 1). 6. In other international datasets, the sample size for 15 to 24 year olds is very small in comparison with the ESS, making the analysis of low participation activities (such as working for a party or action group) or the analysis of youth participation by socio-economic status unreliable (see Table 1). 7. There is an important empirical relationship between the number of young people in a society and their political influence (Adsett 2003 Adsett, M. 2003. Change in Political Era and Demographic Weight as Explanations of Youth "Disenfranchisement" in Federal Elections in Canada, 1965–2000. Journal of Youth Studies, 6(3): 247–64. [Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]). In Europe, the declining proportion of young people has contributed to their declining political influence (Spannring et al. 2008 Spannring, R., Ogris, G. and Gaiser, W., eds. 2008. Youth and Political Participation in Europe. Results of the Comparative Study of EUYOUPART, Opladen: Barbara Budrich. [Google Scholar]). Conversely, the Arab Spring can be partly explained by the large number of (frustrated) 15 to 24 year olds (19 per cent in Tunisia, 17.7 per cent in Libya and 19.7 per cent in Egypt) (Khalaf 2011 Khalaf, R. (2011). 'A Generation at Last in Ferment', The Financial Times (online edition) 23 December, available at http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/de1e960a-2b36-11e1-a9e4-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1pWd2dV9R (accessed 1 March 2012). [Google Scholar]; United Nations 2011 United Nations (2011). World Population Prospects: The 2010 Revision, available at http://esa.un.org/wpp/Documentation/pdf/WPP2010_Volume-I_Comprehensive-Tables.pdf (accessed 1 March 2012). [Google Scholar]). 8. Turnout figures calculated from data available on the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance website. 9. The only EU15 countries that experienced (very small) increases in voter turnout were Luxembourg and Spain. 10. Greece and Luxembourg are excluded because they only returned answers to these questions in one of the five EVS/WVS waves. 11. Ten of the 13 EU15 countries that submitted data for these activities witnessed increases in participation of over 20 per cent in petitions, boycotts and demonstrations since the 1980s. 12. There is a curvilinear relationship between household income and political engagement for young people in these four activities (where the richest and poorest groups both participate at rates above or below the European average). 13. In this respect, the emergence of the new media as a central tool for political engagement may exacerbate these social inequalities in participation (Banaji et al. 2009; Mossberger et al. 2007 Mossberger, K., Tolbert, C. and McNeal, R. 2007. Digital Citizenship: The Internet, Society, and Participation, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar

Democracy · Demographic economics · Economic growth · Economics · European Social Survey · European union · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Population · Sociology · Turnout · Voting · Demography · Electoral Systems and Political Participation · Law · Populism, Right-Wing Movements · Public Administration · Social Media and Politics

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