Participatory Politics and Institutional Politics

MacArthur Research Network came out with a report on Youth & Participatory Politics. It found that a “substantial” number of young people are engaging in online “participatory politics” activities, such as blogging about political interests or circulating videos about political issues and causes.


The study defined “participatory politics” as a number of online activities, including mobilizing networks through social media and circulating information about social or political issues through message board postings or forwarding links to friends via e-mail.

Institutional politics included campaigning for a political candidate or joining a political organization.

According to the report, an estimated 41 percent of young people engage in at least one online form of participatory politics.  An estimated 37 percent of respondents reported engaging in both participatory politics and institutional politics.

The report expresses the hope that the digital channels help to increase the participation of youth in political debates, opinion sharing and voting.

The report found that youth that had engaged in at least one form of participatory politics were found to be almost twice as likely to report voting in 2010 than those that did not report engagement in political behaviors.

http://www.youthtoday.org/view_article.cfm?article_id=5440

http://www.macfound.org/press/publications/study-finds-young-people-using-new-media-participatory-politics/

http://www.macfound.org/media/article_pdfs/YPP_Press_Release_for_06-26-12_FINAL_1.pdf