Grey hair, grey suits, grey minds: Europe’s young want a crack at politics

Opinion by Jim Gibbons

World Forum for Democracy – 3-5 November, 2014: Getting young people engaged in politics is difficult but not impossible. They just need to find ways of overcoming the obstacles – such as bureaucracy and inertia. That was the theme of a round table discussion on the final day of the World Forum for Democracy in Strasbourg, chaired by UK journalist Jim Gibbons and devoted to finding ways of getting the young to engage in the political debate. Some four hundred mainly young people from a wide variety of organizations in Europe and beyond got the chance to put questions to six panellists who’d made it to the dizzy heights of political power or influence.

Dmytro Bulatov, Ukrainian minister for youth and sports, suffered torture at the hands of pro-Russian separatists trying to make him say the uprising against Viktor Yanukovych was funded by the Americans. He required hospital treatment abroad for the injuries he suffered, which included losing part of his right ear. He told delegates that half of the members of the Ukrainian Parliament are under forty years old. “Ukraine is going through a period of change during which the initiatives of young people and civil society are gaining strength,” he said. Asked about Russian aggression he pledged himself to peaceful solutions and urged others to do the same, wherever conflict arises.

His view was echoed by Henryka Mościcka-Dendys, Poland’s under-sectetary of state for European policy, human rights and parliamentary affairs, who recalled her own country’s non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights that overthrew years of Communist rule. She said it was the participation of the young that had made the difference.

One of the turn-offs for the young is that change takes time; it invariably meets resistance, which can be frustrating. Natasa Vuckovic, a member of Serbia’s Parliament and of its delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, warned that the disaffection felt by Serbia’s citizens towards its political system is linked to the failure of democracy to achieve reform at the speeds desired by the public at large. But she also warned against the rise of populist parties offering quick solutions.

Despite the success of inviting 16 to 18-year-olds to vote in Scotland’s independence referendum, only six countries permit them to vote in elections. One of those is Ecuador, and yet a recent survey there found only a disappointing 15% expressed an interest in politics. The Vice-Mayor of Quito, Daniela Chacón, spoke about the challenges: apathy, distrust and a lack of access to the government – problems not unique to Ecuador but part of a seemingly global malaise. She urged the young people listening to engage in politics and help change the system. But it’s no easy for young people to do that; it can be a long and wearily disappointing road. Young people need forums where they can get involved in politics, even if not at national party level, so that they can feed into the mainstream system, according to another speaker, Matt Leighninger, executive director of the US-based Deliberative Democracy Consortium. “The different forms of participation in political life work only if they are combined,” he said.

A comment from the chair that young people usually vote – when given the opportunity – for relatively mainstream parties and that it’s the old, frightened of change, who vote for populist parties drew a round of applause. But it will take great determination, patience and a steely resolve to get past the self-seeking, dyed-in-the-wool party apparatchiks into positions where these keen young democrats can start to influence the way things happen. As Philip Dimitrov, a former prime minister of Bulgaria, put it: “Democracy is freedom accompanied by responsibility.” That takes true grit.

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