Gracie Jenness and Toby White look at political interest among under 18s
Political participation in the modern world is changing now more than ever. Younger people engage more with politics through social media and e-petitions rather than directly voting. This raises the question of whether the UK is going through a crisis in participation in traditional voting systems particularly with regard to the younger generation. So we have decided to investigate this, firstly by interviewing Bexhill College’s very own Politics teacher Joe Langley and find out his thoughts on this potential issue.
First, we talked about barriers. Joe remarked that the biggest barrier for young people getting into politics is the lack of exposure to the topic. Politics is not taught on any curriculum before A Level and in our own experience it is also not encouraged within the school system. Teachers are expected to remain neutral and so politics are often not discussed. In addition to this, A level Politics isn’t an option that is widely offered at most schools meaning on top of the barriers already restricting young people from getting involved in politics, if they were to try to do so it may be even harder if the option is not given to them. The only way for young people to get into politics or gain an interest in it seems to be through their parents or just the people around them. However, this would appear to be a barrier seeing as the views they would develop would be influenced from the people around them, restricting them from gaining their own political views.
Joe also explained that although a lot of younger people are participating online in politics, they are only participating in online; this means they are not voting. There was only a 37% turnout among young people (18-24) in the last election. This is not just down to young people concentrating their engagement on social media; there is also a large amount of young people uneducated about politics. However, the European Union’s youth partnership estimates that 77% of younger people have an interest online in at least one major political issue. This means that younger people do know and are invested in politics and issues surrounding it, but they still don’t vote. We asked Joe why. He put it down to a mix of habit and politicians prioritising older voters: “Voting is something that is more of a habit than a sort of thing that people consciously choose to do. That’s why old people tend to vote more than young people. It’s just a lifelong habit they’ve developed.”
Another factor that could explain why young people don’t vote as much is that many of them feel like their vote won’t change anything. A lot of politics can seem complicated or disconnected from their everyday lives, especially when issues that directly affect young people, like education costs or job opportunities, don’t always feel like a priority in electoral campaigns. Because of this, some younger voters become disengaged before they even start participating, which then continues as they get older. This lack of early engagement reinforces the dominance of the main parties, since the groups who do consistently vote usually older generations end up having more influence over election outcomes and political decisions. Joe explained, “I think politicians know that young people are less likely to vote, which means they’re less likely to have an impact on who’s in charge, which means that politicians wonder why they should spend their time appealing to young people.”
We asked a small group of students for their opinion. They pointed out that due to social media, “It’s impossible not to have on opinion on politics.” Another explained that the eventful politics in America which are all over social media have actually boosted political engagement among young people. The other students supported the idea that interest is increasing, even if participation is not. One student explained that, “I see political stuff on TikTok and Instagram all the time, so even if I’m not trying to follow it, I still end up learning about it,” suggesting that exposure is now almost unavoidable.
Overall, these responses suggest that while political interest among young people is increasing, it is mostly expressed informally online rather than through traditional participation like voting.
