Explaining political inactivity. A research on academic youth in Poland

Abstract

The article is a report on a qualitative study conducted among 703 students from Warsaw/Poland public universities. The purpose of the study was to identify projected behavior in the face of the threat scenario—the so-called “neo-totalitarianism,” created by experts of the Polish Academy of Sciences. The survey was carried out using a proprietary projection test. Based on the written statements of the participants of the study, the reasons for choosing a strategy of non-engagement in the light of rising neo-totalitarianism were presented. The following ways of justifying the lack of any involvement were distinguished: aversion to politics, lack of adequate competence, lack of necessary personality traits, having other priorities and life goals, pointlessness of social activity, fear of possible consequences, focus on one’s own life, inability to identify the reasons for failures, belief in the unlimited right of others to proclaim their own beliefs, and minimalist understanding of democracy.