Young people and democracy: it’s complicated

Participation in healthy democracies can take many forms, such as voting, signing a petition, volunteering, campaigning on an issue or standing for election. Worryingly, research and trends show that young people nowadays are participating far less in civic life than ever before – what is going on?

There is an ongoing debate about whether young people are losing confidence in liberal democracy. Some research appears to show a decline in support, like not voting in elections or joining unions or political parties. However, perhaps more concerning is the worrying loss of trust in politicians and democratic institutions, signalling an increase in anti-democratic values. Adding to concerns, is the fact that young people are hugely under-represented in elected bodies. This can create a vicious cycle whereby young people’s views and concerns are unrepresented, leading them to increasingly to see politics and democracy itself as irrelevant to their interests, making them less likely to engage. On the flip side, it is argued that young people do care about politics and are motivated to engage on issues that concern them, though their preferred modes of engagement may differ from previous generations. Moreover, some argue that Millennials and Generation Z are no less dissatisfied than other age groups with democracy as a system, and that discontentment is driven by other factors than age.

Of course, there is a range of reasons why today’s young people may have different views from previous generations. Young people are learning about politics and civic life in the context of globalisation, digital technologies, mass migration and urbanisation. Their beliefs and behaviours are shaped by the experience of growing up in a more complex and insecure world. As democratic governments everywhere struggle to respond to the big challenges (such as casualised low-paid work, unaffordable housing and climate change) there is a growing gap between what gets delivered, and the concerns and views of young citizens.

What does this mean for democracy?

While the evidence on young people’s views is mixed, there is broad consensus that it is good for democracy for young citizens to be actively engaged in the political process and to feel that they have a voice. In order to improve youth engagement, it is important to understand what interests and motivates young people in relation to politics, as well as to address potential obstacles to their participation.

The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University in the US advocates a shift from ‘mobilising voters’ to ‘growing voters’. CIRCLE focuses on the structural factors that lead to low levels of engagement – including income inequality, racial injustice, educational attainment, political polarisation and the prevalence of civil society/non-profit organisations in the local community. These make up the ‘civic ecosystem’ which should provide young people with opportunities to participate in civic and democratic life and to build the necessary skills and knowledge to be active citizens.

The European Committee of the Regions made recommendations on engaging young people and, perhaps unsurprisingly, it largely focuses on a local level. This includes:

• Programmes to increase youth participation need to go beyond voting and consider other avenues and tools, including schools, youth organisations, civil society and the family. All of these actors play a role in socialising young people in democratic norms.

• Local and regional authorities should involve young people in the design, implementation and monitoring of such programmes.

• Programmes need to be inclusive of marginalised young people, not just the better-educated and economically advantaged.

• Consider the full range of issues in which young people are interested – not just youth policy and education.

• Civic education is important for political awareness and a sense of civic obligation; schools and informal channels can all be involved.

• Greater policy coordination between different tiers of government on youth participation.

• Better transparency and communication – local/ regional governments need to develop communication plans with and for young people, targeted at their needs and preferred channels.

Young people’s faith in democracy matters because political attitudes held when people come of age may become entrenched, leading to a long-term decline in backing for democratic institutions. Of course, young people are not a homogeneous group. Their experiences and attitudes may be influenced by inequality based on ethnicity, gender, nationality, class or location. This may affect how they participate in – and are heard by -national, state and local governments.

It would be naïve to assume that there are simple solutions to issues that are complex and structural. It is not just a case of increasing youth voter registration, encouraging turnout at elections, involving young people in decision making in ways that appeal to them or formulating policies that address their issues and concerns. Rather, an effective response may require all of these things and more.

At LGIU we believe that a global perspective takes us to the heart of the local and that localism and globalism can, indeed must, go together.

Many of the challenges local government faces are global in their scope. Climate change, demographic shock, affordable housing, community resilience, big data, AI, economic development, technology shifts to name but a few: all global trends that come home to roost in local communities across the world and all issues that governments across the world are grappling with.

At LGIU we know that it is difficult, maybe impossible, to respond to these challenges without giving local government a leading role. This is because localism is both a democratic and practical good. Innovation must be local, responsive to specific contexts and draw upon the creativity and civic capacity of local people. But, if we need localism – if we want localism to work – we also need local government as the institutional form that facilitates and legitimises localism.

Local government connects the threads and enables the things that we want to happen. It pulls together the strands – growth, services, delivery, engagement – and gives people a stake in their places. But we also know that around the world local government is, to varying degrees, prevented from playing this role to its full potential. It is hindered by financial constraints and the absence of a sustainable and autonomous funding system. It is subject to ongoing competition around the location of power and which decisions should properly reside at community, local government, regional and national levels. Finally, it is faced with declining levels of trust in political institutions which inhibits participation in civic life.

Together, with our members and the wider sector, we will be establishing a set of new ideas about how local government could work better and how we can build the firm foundations we need to navigate a turbulent and uncertain future, centred around five key questions:

What if local government was funded properly?

We know from international comparisons that different ways of funding local government drive different outcomes and that strong sustainably funded local government is the best way to address regional inequalities and create sustainable growth. What lessons can we learn about the best ways to do this?

What if central government trusted local government to do its job?

Relations between central and local government are often strained. Too often they are seen as a “zero sum” competition for power. We need a different type of conversation about this: one in which form follows function to enable services to be delivered, citizens engaged and decisions made at the appropriate level.

What if people trusted democratic institutions again?

Around the world we see a declining trust in our institutions and administrators. This trust deficit erodes civic life and prevents us from shifting to the sort of co-designed public services we need. Rebuilding public trust is a job for government at all levels. But local democratic institutions - embedded in the very heart of our communities - are in a position to be the keystone of a new understanding.

What if people really participated in local democracy?

Trust in local democratic institutions provides a platform for community engagement. It’s important for pride in place, for well-being and for the creation of social capital but it also sets an essential platform for public service reform. We need to tap into the civic energy and creative insights of citizens and communities, to generate a culture of adaptive innovation, but we need to do this in a way that preserves institutional virtues such as representation, accountability and the balancing of competing interests lgiu.org

Why is local government the answer?

So we begin from a central hypothesis; based on 40 years’ experience of working with local government. If you want to solve the big problems we face you need to begin with the local. You need networks of local action and innovation. But crucially, you need these to be facilitated by local democratic institutions. What we have called connected localism: connected across geographies, across sectors and across the public realm. This is both a democratic and a practical imperative.

Over the course of our LGIU@40 campaign we will be launching a conversation about how we can power up local government to face the future. We will learn from existing reviews and from new research and together, we will map a way forward and take steps to move from aspiration to practical action.

Our aim is to develop a framework that will set local government on the right path for the next forty years, helping it to be the force for change that we all need.