Political Participation and Age: Building an Exploratory Model of Political Participation Based on Life Cycle, Cohort and Period Effects

Abstract

The previous chapter concluded with some empirical evidence on how younger citizens participate politically, it showed that, as expected, young people participated less in institutional activities than adults in 2002 or than young citizens in the 1970s (of the same age). Furthermore, and contrary to what some researchers have suggested, their lower institutional participation does not seem to be compensated for by higher en gage me nt in non-institutional modes of political participation. These findings answer the first question of this study. The defining characteristic of younger citizens’ political participation in the first decade of the 21st century is that they participate less than adults and less than young people from earlier cohorts. There is no indication that they are simply participating differently. Therefore, the next step is to explore the reasons for their lower participation. Specifically, 1 will address the question posed at the beginning of this study: Why do young people participate relatively less in politics than earlier cohorts of the same age?