These Days, Young People Seem To Have An Increasing Interest In Politics. Thank Goodness For That.

The July 12-18 issue of The Economist magazine featured an article titled "My Country, 'Tis Of Thee" that centers on, among other things, emerging trends regarding young voters (in their late-teens and twenties) that at this point seem to be rather encouraging in nature. Before I comment on the article, however, I will provide a couple of the paragraphs that most interested me. Here they are:

"Researchers have found that, by nearly every indicator, Americans' 'civic engagement' declined dramatically in the last three decades of the 20th century. A smaller share of Americans voted, joined civic-minded clubs, attended public meetings or volunteered on a campaign. After September 11th volunteering and some other measures of civic engagement shot up, but that now seems to be reversing....

"Still, Robert Putnam, a Harvard professor whose article 'Bowling Alone' first raised the alarm back in 1995, argues that the generation of Americans currently in their teens and 20s--more deeply affected than their elders by the terrorist attacks--will be the most engaged in their communities since the famous 'greatest generation' of Americans who fought in Europe and then oversaw the prosperity that followed the second world war. Decades long trends are shifting: youth voter turnout has increased in the last three election cycles, the first time that has happened since 18-year-olds were admitted to the franchise. Studies have shown that college students are more interested in talking about and taking part in politics than their counterparts in the 1990s. If the primary campaign was any indication, in the autumn young foot soldiers will not only turn out to vote in large numbers but will also volunteer in droves."

I was one of those university "counterparts in the 1990s" (I'm in my thirties now), and, as a sometime university lecturer in the late 2000s, I can attest to the turnaround in political energy when one compares the present crop of university students to the crop to which I belonged. (I'm obviously speaking in general terms.) For instance, what struck me as I taught university students in the autumn of 2007--one year prior to the general election of 2008--versus when I attended university during, say, the autumn of 1995--one year prior to the general election of 1996--was the level of interest on the part of the students regarding the electoral process in general and the forthcoming presidential campaign in particular. I do not teach political science or political theory (I've primarily taught English in the past), and yet my university students peppered me with questions regarding who I planned to support in the then-forthcoming primary process (it was Governor Bill Richardson at the time, and, since he dropped-out in January of 2008, it has been Senator Barack Obama).

These questions were often rather general to start with, but the more tentatively I answered them, the more pointed they became. In point of fact, I found that a discussion of just about any piece of literature, whether the work was "current" in nature or a bit more of a "relic" from the past, could be counted on to eventually steer toward the issue of politics (though it took some discussions far longer to get there than others). Despite my intense interest in national and international political trends, I found that it was actually the students who steered the discussion toward the political realm about 90% of the time; if and when the discussion wound its way to the forthcoming presidential election, it was again my students who kept the dicussion on that particular topic about 90% of the time.

I should probably take this opportunity to say that I (sometimes) teach at a university that is not at all known for its political activism, and, if anything, the majority of students there (if not a big majority) are known to lean a bit more to the American political right than the American political left, though it's of course the case that the school features students from all across the political spectrum. But that's the point: I found that my students were interested in placing themselves along political spectrums--often several different political spectrums at once, due to their interests in a variety of political topics and issues--though they were often not interested in being "chained" to those spectrums; they were intrigued by politics in general (particularly national and international politics) and often considered themselves independent-enough thinkers to avoid buying wholesale into any one blanket political ideology.

They certainly managed to get me to discuss some of my political views, though I of course told them that I do not give out final grades based on political ideology, but rather based on hard work, consistency, and improvement (particularly in the areas of writing and argument-construction). Perhaps this caveat helped them to feel better about sharing their personal views of political topics, but I somewhat surprisingly got the sense that, for the most part, they would have shared their political views regardless. This was increasingly the case as each semester went by during the first chunk of time I taught at that particular university, between 2002 and 2004, but after moving to England and then moving back to the United States in the late summer of 2007--and teaching at the same university--I noticed that the scenario had accelerated mightily in the several years I had been away.

This is, to my mind, a good scenario, but then again I am someone who was interested in national and international politics when I was at a similar university in the mid-1990s, and I struggled to find folks who had anything but a passing interest such topics. Though I majored in English, I took many Political Science and History classes, and my "Comparative World Politics" class, which was taught by a wonderfully-informed, worldly professor, was one of the best classes I took as an undergraduate student. It was also nearly-empty; though there were spaces for upwards of thirty-five or, at a push, forty students, only ten of us signed-up for it. Of those ten, only about four of us were particularly interested in the material (though we all thought the professor brought the material to life in an engaging manner). In my "History of the Middle East" class, which featured closer to twenty-five students (again, there were spaces for forty students), less than half of us were particularly engaged in the material, despite the fact that the professor, originally from the United States, had lived in the Middle East for several years and had only recently returned to his native country; his lectures were filled with information and anecdotal extrapolation, and I found them almost uniformly superb.

I joined two political clubs--both quite briefly--during my undergraduate years. The first one was the College Republicans, which I must admit I joined because their brochure found its way into my mailbox prior to the College Democrats' brochure finding its way there. (I thought I'd reward their industry and efficiency.) I didn't particularly think of myself as a Republican at the time (obviously, I still don't), but I went to several meetings regardless, which featured an average of about fifteen students, only to find the conversations and plans for political activism awfully limp and so general as to apply to just about any group outside of, say, the College Communists. So I quit the College Republicans in order to join the College Democrats, who had slightly fewer members but in all other respects eerily resembled the College Republicans. My stay in their ranks was similarly brief.

There were politically-active, politically-intrigued university students--at my university and at others--during the 1990s, and had I motivated myself to a greater extent, perhaps I could have helped some of them found a serious political organization. I didn't motivate myself to do that, however, and instead followed national and international politics closely in a solo, cerebral manner alone. (I used to drive my college roommate crazy by watching coverage of the run-up to the 1997 British general election when it was on cable television for a few months, which I believe was broadcast only during the very early morning hours each Tuesday.)

Yet the problem with that era was that too many people were comfortable engaging in politics like I did--in an internal manner alone--the various reasons for which are infinitely interesting as well as topics for a different but probably equally-important conversation, perhaps to be had another time. There is nothing wrong, and probably everything right, with critical, internal engagement in politics, but the point is that such engagement was often an end in and of itself. (It certainly was for me.) These days, however, something that I consider rather special is happening in that an increasing number of students are not settling for esoteric engagement in politics alone (again, the reasons for which are fascinating, but too layered and intricate to fit in this blog-post), but are rather demanding that the internal be brought into the external realm; they are demanding that politics be discussed openly and in many settings, and that the connections between politics and various aspects of life in general (and academic subjects in particular) be explored.

Good for them. I demand of these increasing numbers of politically-active American university students (and their slightly older peers in their 20s) only one thing: increase the intensity of your demands that the discussion of politics be brought into the public realm more often, and continue to do so in a manner that draws distinctions between differing political persuasions without demonizing any but the most draconian political groups. Also, do all of this with the understanding that the U.S. political system was set-up to accomodate differing viewpoints but also to force a certain amount of political compromise (which, contrary to popular belief, is not always a bad word) between these various groups.

Above all, my goodness, don't be as afraid as I was to be outwardly politically-active. And please do something that took me a while to learn how to do: if someone calls you a "nerd" for caring about politics, embrace the term. As far as I'm concerned, we need far more folks like you in this world than we have at present.