Rural youth's political engagement depends heavily on local geography
A Swedish study finds that young people in rural areas face distinct barriers to political participation based on their physical location and distance from urban centers. The findings challenge policymakers to design youth engagement strategies that account for geography, not just age or demographics.
Originaltitel: Place and youth political action: how place shapes political action in rural Sweden
<p>There are important gaps in the research on youth political action due to a lack of attention to the roles of place and the experiences of young people in rural places. To address these gaps, this article presents findings from intensive interviews with 15 young people (aged between 16 and 29 years) who identified as politically/socially engaged and lived or had recently lived in a rural place in Sweden. Analysis of their responses, based on constructivist-grounded theory, shows that place dimensions shaped three social processes of young people’s political action: engaging in politics in (rural) places, finding recognition as political actors in (rural) places and negotiating political belonging in relation to (urban) places. By linking these processes with Agnew’s three-dimensional understanding of place, the analysis provides novel insights into how various dimensions of place shape crucial social processes of youth political action.</p>