Magda Jorge's Blog

Young people’s political engagement has been notoriously low in comparison to the rest of the UK’s population- since Brexit, the turnover in voters aged between 18-25 has definitively magnified. I propose that the EU Referendum increased young people’s political engagement, resulting in the increase of young voters.

The EU Referendum took place in June 2016, almost one and half years ago, yet it seems as if it was only yesterday considering it remains a topic of debate. Since the EU Referendum, a general election took place in June 2017 that confirmed a majority of the votes appointed to the Conservative Party. The results of the 2017 general election confirmed young people’s political engagement rose by around 20% according to the estimated data collected by Ipsos MORI, there was a drastic turnover in young people aged between 18-24 who voted, levels not seen since the 1990s (Sloam et al, 2017).

Fig.1

Source: Turnout by age group, 2015 and 2017 general elections. Ipsos MORI, 2017.

Figure 1 shows the comparison between the general election in 2015 to the general election that took place in 2017, following the EU Referendum, prior to this, young people’s involvement in electoral politics diminished from 23 points in 2015 to only 4 points in the general election in 2017. Why is it that the 2015 general election showed that young people aged below 35, as being less engaged in politics than those over 35.  Although young people are actively interested in specific individual issues, their political disengagement in regards to political parties, their institutions and the process of the political electoral is clear. As Sloam (2013) suggests young people are not unresponsive to politics but rather, they have their own views and engage in democracy in a wide variety of ways.

Did  Brexit, create a new wave of political interest amongst young citizens? I would say so! Brexit prompted young people to put their vote to use, driven by a decision that would impact young people’s daily lives, according to a report released following the 2017 general election stating that young people who identify with politics ‘time- to – time’ are characterised as ‘stand-by’ citizens (Sloam et al, 2017). Has Brexit formed ‘standby’ citizens or has the data from the general election in 2017 suggest a promising rise in young voters interest in politics.

Brexit triggered political grief amongst youngsters, with many seeing it as diminishing their future opportunities and ties with Europe. The most recent decennial Census in 2011 estimated that there are around 3.7million EU nationals living in the UK that is roughly 6% of the UK population (Hawkins, 2018).

Fig.  2

Source: Office for National Statistics, 2017

The above chart shows the estimated number of EU citizens living in the UK, but equally the 2011 Census estimated that there are around 890,000 British nationals living in other EU countries with around 1.14 million people born in the UK living in other EU countries (Hawkins, 2018). Many EU national’s and UK nationals with family in the EU could be potentially affected with the new terms of Brexit, however having said this, a member of the youth campaign ‘Our future our choice’ argues that the terms of the new Brexit remain unclear. As a result, Femi Oluwole argues that there should be a public vote prior to finalising Brexit.

Our future ties with Europe are one of the reasons for Brexit influencing young people to Vote, results from the Youth Quake report in 2017 suggest that age replaced class and that this could be explained through a deepened cultural acceptance. ‘Young people are more likely to welcome European integration and less concerned about immigration than the older generation’ (Sloam et al, 2017: 7).

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Source: Twitter feed’s, 2018

The question that I believe to be true is that Brexit did challenge our political apathy as a nation, but moreover, the incline in young people voting has risen beyond other age categories. But how so? Youth campaigns similar to ‘Our future our choice’ provide alternative means of protesting, including signing online petitions, liking or promoting political material on social media such as on twitter, Instagram and facebook. Social media is used mostly commonly by the younger generation, 48% gathered political news through social media, compared to 22% for all age groups (Sloam et al, 2018). The figures are also similar in the United States, with 10% of over 65’s likely to follow political candidate via social media (Raine et al, 2012)

It is fair to say that Brexit is indeed still developing a political effect on young people, the 2017 general election did see higher numbers of young voters compared with any other year, the re-engagement of young voters has been labelled a political ‘youthquake’ (Sloam et al, 2017). The interests of the younger generation and our future should be prioritised, starting with creating momentum in young people to vote, creating alternative means of voting such as online voting, in the video below presenter Rick Edwards stated that 75% of young people would vote if it were online! If that were the case our voices would be heard in the masses!

References

Euronews. (2018). ‘UK needs public vote on Brexit terms’- youth campaign group OFOC. [Online] Available at: http://www.euronews.com/2018/02/18-uk-needs-public-vote-on-brexit-terms-femi-oluwole-tells-euronews [Accessed 17 Feb. 2018]

Full Fact. (2018). Has there been a ‘Brexodus’ of EU citizens since the referendum? Available at: https://fullfact.org/immigration/eu-citizens-brexodus/ [Accessed 18 Feb. 2018].

Fleming, L. (2018) What information is there on British migrants living in Europe? – office for National Statistics. [Online] Ons.gov.uk. Available at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/internationalmigration. [Accessed 18 Feb. 2018]

Ipsos MORI (2017) How Britain voted in the 2017 election. https://www.ipsos.com/ipsos-mori/en-uk/how-britain-voted-2017-election. [Accessed 10 Feb. 2018].

Hawkins, O. (2018). Migration Statistics, Commons Library briefing – UK. Available at: http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/SN06077 [Accessed 17 Feb. 2018).

Ipsos MORI (2018) How Britain voted in the 2016 EU referendum. Available at: https://www.ipsos.com/ipsos-mori/en-uk/how-britain-voted-2017-eu-referendum [Accessed 10 Feb. 2018].

Sloam, J. Ehsan, M. (2017). Youth Quake: Young people and the 2017 General Election. Available at: http://www.if.org.uk/research-posts/youth-quake-young-people-2017-general-election. [Accessed 2 Feb. 2018]

Rainie, L.  Smith, A., Schlozman, K. L., Brady, H. and Verba, S. (2012) Social Media and Political Engagement. Pew Internet, Pew Research Center: Washington D.C. Available at:  http://www.pewinternet.org/files/oldmedia/Files/Reports/2012/PIP_SocialMediaAndPoliticalEngagement_PDF.pdf (2) [Accessed 15 Feb. 2018]

Sloam, J. (2013). Young people are less likely to vote than older citizens, but they are also more diverse in how they choose to participate in politics. Available: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2013/07/19/young-people-are-less-likely-to-vote-than-older-citizens-but-they-are-also-more-diverse-in-how-they-choose-to-participate-in-politics/. [Accessed 18 Feb. 2018]