Report
Kan deltagande i skolval stärka ungas delaktighet i demokratin?
2023Lundberg, E., & Lundin, H.Policy brief, bilaga 3 i Skolval 2022 i samband med riksdagsvalet. Myndigheten för ungdoms- och civilsamhällesfrågor
What is this study about?
The study examines whether participation in mock elections can help strengthen young people's participation in democracy. Based on the experiences of Skolval 2022 (the 2022 school election), it analyses how students perceive the significance of the school election for, among other things, their political knowledge, interest, engagement and confidence in their own ability to understand and participate in politics. The study also considers whether the significance of mock elections differs between different groups of students.
What did we find?
The results indicate that mock elections can be an important arena for young people's first concrete encounters with representative democracy. Participating students get the opportunity to engage with political issues, parties and the election process itself, and participation is particularly associated with higher self-assessed political knowledge. The associations with political interest, engagement and political self-efficacy are weaker and vary between different groups of students. The significance of the school election is thus not the same for all young people.
Why does it matter?
Young people have limited opportunities to participate in general elections before they turn 18, while important political orientations develop much earlier. Mock elections can therefore offer a concrete opportunity to practise democratic participation before the first real election. At the same time, the results show that simply holding a mock election is not enough: how it is prepared, integrated into teaching and made accessible to different groups of students is important if it is to contribute to broad and inclusive democratic participation.
Citation
Lundberg, E., & Lundin, H. (2023) Kan deltagande i skolval stärka ungas delaktighet i demokratin?. Policy brief, bilaga 3 i Skolval 2022 i samband med riksdagsvalet. Myndigheten för ungdoms- och civilsamhällesfrågor
Research area
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