Supplementary > November 18, 2004

How can we keep young voters engaged?

By Farai Chideya

The Democrats and progressives were awash in money in 2004. Some of it went to the right places; some of it did not. How do you know? By using a best-practices model to examine who did what in 2004, how effective those efforts were, how to replicate what worked and how to share resources.

Take the efforts aimed at young Americans. Did marketing-based approaches like Citizen Change’s “Vote or Die?” campaign get people to the polls or leave them feeling oversold? Did the League of Pissed Off Voters’ election guides hit their mark? And whose outreach and fundraising models, like MoveOn.org’s, work the best?

This also means rethinking longstanding assumptions. For decades, foundations have said they don’t fund media. Fine. Young Americans don’t read or watch much media, with the exception of “The Daily Show.” And for years, news consumption and voting trended downward together. In 2004, voting went up.

Now is the time to reach those new voters with media that gives them hope, that speaks to them in their language, about their issues, with a sense of humor. Otherwise, they will feel burned—as if they played their part but the system still didn’t work. Good conduits of information will let younger Americans—and all Americans—know that politics doesn’t begin and end on one day every four years. It’s about being a part of your community, dealing with issues both local and global, empowering yourself and caring about the future.

Technology can help increase efficiency of media production and distribution. For example, no one—yet—is effectively aggregating and distributing youth-oriented and college media about politics and public policy. The nonprofit I founded is trying to help build that infrastructure, and there’s no reason it can’t happen. We can revolutionize the way a disaffected public views political culture. It’s time.

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• Reader Comments

  Aw come on let kids be kids and enjoy childhood! How young are you talking about teaching them about politics ? thats all we need is kids becoming terribly cynical before they even get to high school! i mean this all tounge in cheek of course but kidding aside don’t you think up to a point that kids get a lot of their early political views from their folks. I know that kids out of being contarary and rebellious will take the position exactly opposite of their folks. Do you propose to indoctrinate them only in the liberal/progressive viewpoint? In case you don’t know(once again tounge in cheek) there are many voices saying that there is a major political imbalance of left leaning viewpoints and political correctness in todays colleges. you run the risk of a major battle if some kind of diversity of ideas is not maintained.

  Posted by redstate on Nov 18, 2004 at 7:02 PM

  SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY STUDENTS GAVE DEM CHALLENGER DAVE VALESKY 76% AND 900 VOTES IN HIS WIN BY 464 VOTES FOR NYS SENATE.
  We succeeded quite well in getting Syracuse Univesity students engaged in the ‘04 elections.
  Student Assn. President Andrew Lederman hosted a six-week series of Candidate Debates where opposing candidates debated on Monday nights at
  Maxwell School--five NYS posts, plus the candidates for Congress.

  Also, students ran GOTV Dorm Vote, with a coordinator in each of thirteen dorms, ushering 1000+ voters to campus polls. Result: Democrat Dave Valesky upset the GOP NYS Sen. Nancy Larraine Hoffmann by 464 votes (of 115,000 votes cast), winning 76% (900 votes) from SU Dorm voters; Kerry got 85%; Bush 13%.

  Hoffmann blundered by skipping the Sept 20
  SU debate with Valesky to attend opening night of the Syr Symphony--Valesky spoke to the debate audience, largely students, scoring points with his candor and call for campaign volunteers for phonebanks, flyering, door to door, etc.

  Hoffmann herself had won the Senate seat in 1984 by 233 votes over Sen. Martin Auer, with a plurality of 383 votes from SU dorm students.

  But from 1985 to 1992, the local Elections Board, including the Democrat Commissioner, refused to allow both campus and off-campus students to vote here, classifying them as “non-residents.”

  Result: In 1988, the Democrat challenger to Cong. Jim Walsh lost by 800 votes--less than the amount of SU student vote pluralities in previous Cong. elections.  I wouldn’t be surprised that politicians are concerned about the SU student vote in the ‘05 elections for city council and Onondaga County Legislature.

  Posted by Austin Paulnack on Nov 19, 2004 at 7:16 PM

  It appears were are seeing a polarization in the youth’s political involvement. There is the “I don’t know anything about politics”, who wants none of it, and the organized and well-networked activist youth, which is much more involved than your average middle-aged voter. However, it would be unfair to single out the youth for its political apathy, which is much more widespread. What’s more, we run the risk of overestimating voting as a form of political expression. Websites, blogs, email listserves, manifestations, protests, music, art sustainable and fair-buying practices… all those often lay outside pundits and pollsters’ radars and therefore there is a tendency to downplay political involvement.

  Besides, lest we forget, these “kids” are all someone’s children. How much political awareness (if any) has been passed on by the parents/household? If there was none, how and why should we expect a kid to tune in to C-SPAN on the day he turns 18? I don’t mean to take this into a “blame the victim” argument, but clearly the youth is a product of its environment, and so we can’t negate the effect of their upbringing.

  Low young voter turnouts didn’t happen overnight. It’s about time we woke up and smelled the coffee, however we’d be deluding ourselves it we hope to reverse a slow and steady trend in time for the next elections. What will be interesting is to see if, in 10-20 years, this generation will carry its behaviour onto its new demographic bracket, or if they will vote in same numbers as current 30-40-somethings.

  Posted by Sebastian in Mtl on Dec 1, 2004 at 2:28 PM

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