Abstract
In a time where youth-led movements like Fridays-for-Future make the news, it is easy to think that European youth has found their role as citizens in a society. Ultimately, the way young citizens act in the political system they have been socialized in, is an important indication about the state of this political system. But while societies at large mostly care about the question if youth is active, researchers from disciplines like political science, psychology, sociology, cultural and media studies, and communication science have an ongoing interest in the question, how young citizens act politically and what these acts entail.
This book reintroduces these questions by focusing on Youth Active Citizenship in Europe. The edited volume gathers ethnographic studies on young political activists. In the beginning, it problematizes the ‘binaries of civic participation’. The editors Shakuntala Banaji and Sam Mejias argue that questions about what is ‘political’ or what counts as ‘active’ have been answered unsatisfactory by large-scale survey research's attempt to categorize the rich field of youth engagement. The goal of this volume, hence, is to go beyond these categories and to provide insights into how young Europeans become active in political matters.
It approaches the question of what active citizenship today entails from a variety of angles and theoretical schools: What are motivations of being active? What is the role of emotions for participation? How diverse are youth movements and what are the chances of an activist burnout? For readers of International Journal of Press and Politics, Chapter 6 on “Hybridity in the Media and Political Strategies of Leftist Youth Organisations” by Alena Macková Macková, Sam Mejias and Jakub Macek may be of greatest interest, as it illustrates the long-known struggle of balancing communication strategies between offline and digital activities.
There are several things to like about this book: First, the cases of ethnographic studies undertaken in eight countries—the Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Sweden and the UK— are illustrative of youth engagement to an extent that quantitative research will never be. The rich ethnographic work, that often spans several days or weeks, gives the reader the feeling to come closer to young citizens on this continent. It often has a hopeful tone, for example, when an interviewee from Estonia summarizes a group meeting: “It is so nice to see that you have a whole group of people who bother to sit a whole week in some airless room and discuss it all day long on that topic … I see that people put their soul into it and this just gives so much energy.“ (p. 203). The details, the subtunes, and often the bluntness of responses gathered throughout the fieldwork give the reader a more realistic understanding of how some young citizens feel about their role in society.
Second, the work problematizes trends in youth activism that likely have existed for longer, but are now taken more seriously: How can voluntary, independent youth work prevail without external funding and how should it deal with funding by commercial parties? How much do members of an organization believe in achieving change and how often is their work self-perpetuating, as one interviewee indicates: “We do try to give that appearance of being young, youthful and vibrant and stuff like that. But it’s also just a media narrative.” (p. 144)? Addressing how much activity activism needs – and when young citizens engage to an extent that is harmful for themselves – is another example of how the book balances positive and negative sides of youth citizenship in its reports. Although there is little indication that an ‘activist burnout’ is a common phenomenon, the findings here illustrate how a small part of youth tries to compensate for the majority of their peers who remain inactive.
Third, the work is nuanced in the way it treats important topics in youth activism. Diversity receives attention by shedding light on circumstances where youth work struggles to be as inclusive as stated in organizations’ own goals. The book thereby differentiates between understanding diversity as inclusion of different age groups, or being diverse by engaging members of ethnic minorities. Many studies touch upon the question of what motivates youth engagement and show a full spectrum, from the wish to achieve social change, dutiful citizenship norms, or the simple aspect of having fun and being part of a group, whereas the political notion fades into the background.
With regards to limitations, at the beginning the book proposes a typology of active citizenship ranging from ‘Generally active in dutiful and conformist ways’, over ‘Generally active in anti-democratic and authoritarian ways’, to ‘Generally inactive/passive/disengaged’. The authors explicitly mention that they do not deal with non-engagement or activism in anti-democratic movements. The rich work in this book is, hence, mainly concerned with liberal and socially progressive youth activism. It helps understand a certain share of youth citizenship, while other developments, such as growing influence of far-right youth organizations or non-engaged young citizens are left uncovered.
The book does not provide a final answer on what Active Youth Citizenship is. All authors show that youth citizenship is context-dependent, differs strongly between individuals and countries, and is changing throughout the developmental stages of young citizens. By reading this book, it becomes clear that many ambitious initiatives of youth work in Europe exist. The focus on the young activists in this book makes it difficult to make explicit statements about their role in society. What becomes clear is that youth active citizenship in Europe is often fun and sometimes exhaustive. It can be inclusive as well as exclusive. Digital media play an important role for young activists and becoming active in youth organizations shapes what kind of citizens they will be. The findings of this book thereby support earlier work in developmental, socialization, and communication research. While Active Youth Citizenship for sure is a moving target, this book shows that many aspects of how young citizens understand their role in society remain stable, as times are changing.