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Kirsten
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Engaging youth in Politics
October 12, 2007 - 04:59 PM
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Recently there has been a lot of research conducted on how youth are not interesting in mainstream politics and voting. Is this just a North American phenomenon or is it a worldwide situation? How do you think we can get youth interested in voting again?
I recently read an article on my way to work in Toronto on the mock-elections that Ontario schools do. Here under-age voters have the chance to learn about the parties and their platforms. The hope is that by giving students a taste of politics, they'll become more engaged and interested enough to cast real ballots when they turn 18. Do you think this is something that will work?
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Prince Charles Jiduwah
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 14, 2007 - 06:26 AM
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This just does not happen in North America, it is becoming a problem in Africa as well.... Nigeria in view. I guess the way out of this is to get the youth understand their role in their society. That can be done through forums and workshops. I like the Mock Voting thing.
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Erick Ochieng Otieno
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 14, 2007 - 02:43 PM
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kirstenjordan wrote:
Recently there has been a lot of research conducted on how youth are not interesting in mainstream politics and voting. Is this just a North American phenomenon or is it a worldwide situation? How do you think we can get youth interested in voting again?
I recently read an article on my way to work in Toronto on the mock-elections that Ontario schools do. Here under-age voters have the chance to learn about the parties and their platforms. The hope is that by giving students a taste of politics, they'll become more engaged and interested enough to cast real ballots when they turn 18. Do you think this is something that will work?
I thought it was only the Kenyan problem. That the youths do not vote in other places makes the issue a global problem that needs to be addressed. For instance in Kenya, we are headed for the General Election at the end of the year and everyone has been walking around urging the youth to turn up in large numbers to excercise their rights to vote. Having said that, I will not be supprised if at the end of the voting session, there is just a few percentage of youths who indeed voted.
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Brigid
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 20, 2007 - 04:52 AM
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In Australia once you turn 18 it's compulsory to vote so it's not a problem that we don't vote-just that a lot of us don't understand who we're voting for or just don't care. It became compulsory last year for australian schools to educate students on voting and the parliamentary system in a hope to reduce this but the same youth that 'don't care' are still not taking their vote seriously. We need to be making youth aware that their opinion does matter, accepting youth as a vital part of our society -listening to them instead of the cliched 'children should be seen not heard' view that many seem to still hold. I was involved in a ymca program called youth parliament this year in which we got to write a bill and debate it in the parliamentary chambers so it really gives youth an insight into what politicians do and gives youth a voice and a passion to have their say. most of us in the program were under 18 and couldn't wait to be able to cast our vote some even debating to lower the voting age so that it was optional for 16 and 17 year olds to be able to vote as well. I think programs like this (mock voting and parliaments) and education would help to alleviate this problem of youth not voting and not caring but sadly they'll always be a percentage (even in a compulsory system) of youth that throw away their vote .
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muhammad kamal kamel
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 28, 2007 - 04:53 PM
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it is a world widespread phenomun...here in my country EGYPT...no one care for the mainstream politics......even the elder ones...because almost a great branch of society lost hope in affecting their stance and have their freedom to choose......we have democracy but not all the time........and sometimes the governmental forces like police....threats our freedom by capture anyone talks in relgion in the field in politics......i'm not with that but what they are doing is so harnful and make alot of the youth afraid................
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Ashley
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 29, 2007 - 11:24 AM
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kirstenjordan wrote:
Recently there has been a lot of research conducted on how youth are not interesting in mainstream politics and voting. Is this just a North American phenomenon or is it a worldwide situation? How do you think we can get youth interested in voting again?
I recently read an article on my way to work in Toronto on the mock-elections that Ontario schools do. Here under-age voters have the chance to learn about the parties and their platforms. The hope is that by giving students a taste of politics, they'll become more engaged and interested enough to cast real ballots when they turn 18. Do you think this is something that will work?
My social studies class in Alberta did something similar to this. I think we even had students volunteer to "represent" the individual parties and give a speech in support of why to vote for them. It was a great project - I remember it being very exciting and heated, people were really involved and interested.
I think it is a great idea because if anything it gets youth thinking about their right to vote. I'm not sure if it would have an impact on "future" voter turn out though... but hopefully it gets a couple of more people interested and out there.
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palymc
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
January 15, 2008 - 06:00 AM
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i think this is an important issue . and i think youth ppl should be part of the political process because they are part of the community . youth will be the leaders of the community after few years . i think that the youth began to realize this thing forexample in the american primary election. all media and observers are surprised because of the activity of american youth in this elections specially Mr. Obama 's campaign.
in our area youth also share and work in the political fields . we have many youths parties and groups who work to reach their views and opinions to the ppl
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Kelli
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
April 19, 2008 - 04:28 PM
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i think if we teach high school kids about politics and have discussions at school about what is happening in politics Today, they will become aware and more interested in whats going on, and WANT to have a say in it. that way they'll be more involved in politics when they're old enough to vote.
This post was edited on: 2008-04-19 at 04:31 PM by: Kell4424
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ezy
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
June 30, 2008 - 11:05 AM
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I strongly believe it is the right aproach because, our youth are our future. They have to be well informed right from school and taught the basic principles of how to go about it. Politics is not some thing you can jump into. you have to be exposed to the rudiments of politics from the early age.
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Michael
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
July 10, 2008 - 04:00 AM
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Well i think the mock thing is actually a brilliant idea that prepares the young stars for participation in the democratisation process of their country.
In Zimbabwe there is a puzzling trend.You will remember that we went into an election on March 29 which was won by Morgan Tsvangirayi and then proceeded to a run off election on June 27 in which Robert Mugabe's militia ran over the Zimbabwean population and this resulted in Morgan Tsvangirayi withdrawing.What is puzzling is that the percentage of youths who voted was disappointingly low yet the youth where in the fore front of terrorising the populace.
Politicians use youths to do their dirty work.These same politicians have disempowered the youths by mismanaging the economy and this has resulted in job losses.The youth therefore are victims of the policies of egocentric politicians.Because they are not beneffiting anything they see no reason why they should go and vote for someone so that that individual benefits at their exspense.Unless and until there is marked improvement in the concietisation of the youths about why it is important for them to participate in the democritisation process of Zimbabwe they will not.
We will continue to endure beatings, harrasment and torture at the hands of ZANU PF militia which unfortunately the government has done a good job in making sure they are well indoctrinated .
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Michael Mabwe
Coordinator
Zimbabwe Poets for Human Rights
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Annpreet M
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
September 6, 2008 - 01:12 PM
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Youth these days are not interested in Politics. At my school in Toronto we had mock elections, and many students did not just care. There mindset is im not old i don't have to care, this "stupidness" does not bother me. Don't get me wrong this isn't all of them but the vast majority of youth. They are more intuned with the fashion and media and feel that politics does not play a role in their lives.
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Michael G.
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 3, 2008 - 09:10 AM
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A lot of my friends have actually gotten interested in the US Presidential Elections this year just because they're so historic (first African American, first woman...)
And I've always been involved in politics =D Over the summer I volunteered with the Obama campaign.
I don't think you can force it, though. There are some people who just like it, and if you don't like participating in politics, you're not going to be able to make them. For many people, the government isn't actively involved in their lives.
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Dee
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 3, 2008 - 02:18 PM
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I think the main reason that the youth are getting involved in politics is the fact that we are all growing up. These issues we hear about become real as time goes by.
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Hafiidhaturrahmah
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 4, 2008 - 11:53 AM
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i agree to engaging youth in politics so they can learn more about this.
but...I disagree if youth just became chess point of politic to win something.
so---let's choose the best political engagement.
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Ute
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Re: Engaging youth in Politics
October 24, 2008 - 03:05 AM
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Well -its kind of hard to be interested in voting when the electoral process is a big joke - in my country's chaotic 2007 Dec elections after all the violence and killing a commission was set up (in June 2008) and they said they were unable to determine the winner of the election becoz there was rigging by both candidates!!
So in the end, does your vote REALLY count?
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