Suchergebnisse

Turnout among young adults has declined steadily in various advanced industrial democracies in recent decades. At the same time, as a consequence of delayed transitions to adulthood, many life-cycle events considered important for the development of electoral participation are experienced later in life. These combined trends call for a revaluation of the political life-cycle model and the way in which it explains voter turnout among young adults. More specifically, in this paper it is argued that variation in the timing of life events has been overlooked as an explanatory factor of generational differences in young adults' propensity to turn out to vote. With accumulating evidence that the decision to vote is to some extent habitual, a lack of life experiences may cause young adults to form the habit to abstain rather than to vote. If the mechanisms of the life-cycle model are indeed correct, later maturation should at least partially explain why young adults these days are less inclined to vote than their parents or grandparents in their younger years. Based on the British Election Studies from 1964 to 2010, the findings of this study confirm generally observed patterns of a delayed assumption of adult roles by young citizens. This trend toward later maturation negatively affects turnout levels of young citizens. If maturation levels had remained at pre-war levels, the average turnout among Britain's post-seventies generation would have been no less than 12 percentage points higher.

Defense date: 15 March 2010 ; Examining Board: André Blais (Université de Montréal) (External Supervisor), Mark N. Franklin (EUI), Marc Hooghe (Catholic University Leuven), Alexander H. Trechsel (EUI) (Supervisor) ; This thesis departs from the observation that in some countries such as Canada the age gap in voter turnout between younger and older citizens is widening. It does so because of a rapid turnout decline among the youngest electoral cohorts. These findings prompt the following question: What are trends in the age gap in voter turnout between younger and older citizens in other Western democracies, and how can these trends be accounted for? Plotting over-time age differences for ten countries, this thesis shows that age patterns in voter turnout are far from generic. Evidence of a widening generational divide is found in Canada, Denmark, Great Britain, Norway, and the United States. The age gap in Finland, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden, on the hand, turns out to be relatively stable or even trendless through time. Turning from description to explanation, this thesis presents a novel hypothesis to account for declining turnout levels among young voters. Combining the life-cycle and cohort/generation approaches to age differences in political participation, the later maturation hypothesis examines the idea that the timing of certain life-cycle events that are considered important for the development of political participation varies from one generation to the next. Since key events such as leaving school, starting a first job, getting married and starting a family nowadays take place at a higher average age than they used to, later maturation should be able to explain turnout decline among young voters at least partially. Based on data from the British Election Studies from 1964 to 2005, this thesis shows that delays in the timing of life-cycle events are indeed negatively related to individual level youth voter turnout. Attendance of religious services, levels of political interest, turnout at previous elections, perceived party differences and strength of party identification also explain over-time differences in youth voter turnout. The largest share of individual level youth turnout is, however, accounted for by turnout trends in the rest of the electorate. At the aggregate level later maturation is also shown to explain part of the widening of the age gap. The political-institutional context, however, explains between-country differences best.

Though the impact of deliberative polling on attitude change has received ample attention in the literature, micro models of attitude change before, during, and after deliberation are understudied. The relative strength of three competing views of the way attitudes change—the heuristics, systematic, and deliberative models—is assessed, using the quasi-experimental data of the EuroPolis deliberative project and comparing a group of people who participated in the deliberative poll with a control group. The results are: (1) in line with the systematic model, predispositions play a larger role than in the heuristics or deliberative models; (2) predispositions play a different role for participants and nonparticipants; (3) predispositions shape attitude formation in different ways depending on the issue at hand. On some issues the beliefs of participants change as a consequence of deliberation and become more complex and nuanced than before. This is, however, not the case for immigration issues where deliberation seems to strengthen predispositions.

Research suggests that the rightist discourse on immigration appeals to left-leaning citizens with lower levels of education. The opposite is, however, not true for right-wing voters with lower educational levels, and this asymmetry leaves left-wing parties at a disadvantage compared with the right on immigration and integration issues. Deliberative theory promises that discussion, information and reflection can promote a more balanced political discussion and a more enlightened citizen. This article assesses the extent to which deliberative polling increases the ideological awareness of citizens with lower educational levels. More specifically, it gauges the extent to which especially less well educated left-wing voters - those whose attitudes research finds to be particularly out of tune with their ideological predispositions regarding immigration and integration - adjust their attitudes as a consequence of deliberate exposure to informational input and the presentation of two-sided arguments. Use is made of unique data generated during the first European-wide deliberative polling project, 'EuroPolis', held in 2009. The results indicate that less well educated left-wing voters indeed have slightly more negative attitudes towards immigrants than leftist voters with secondary or post-secondary educational levels. Turning to the micro-mechanisms of attitude change in a deliberative setting, the analyses show that both levels of education and ideological predispositions play a role in the extent to which participants of the deliberative poll adjust their attitudes. In three out of four models, evidence is found that less well educated left-leaning citizens are indeed most likely to adjust their attitudes on immigration and integration after being presented with a more balanced discussion of the topic. Adapted from the source document.