European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) Workshop, March 29th-April 2nd, 2015, University of Warsaw, Poland.

Bernard Fournier [Bernard.Fournier@me.com et http://bernardfournier.wordpress.com] Quentin Genard [quentin.genard@gmail.com]

When Participation Becomes “Civic” A Survey among 16-19-Year-Old Students in Belgium

Bernard Fournier (Vrije Universiteit Brussel)

Quentin Genard (Université de Liège) Preliminary draft. Please do not quote without permission.

Abstract Several researches have showed that adolescents and young people in general are not interested in politics and do not want to be involved in political parties. On the contrary, they seem to favour largely participation in organisations campaigning for the defence of human rights or the environment (civic participation). However, this image does not show the complex web of relationships between participation and interest of today’s youth. First, the purpose of this paper is to suggest a more complex image considering the interest in politics and the reality of participation. Second, we would like to compare the set of values among participants: do they contest our present social and economical system or do they share their core values? Are they so opposed to “traditional” politics and how? In fall 2011, we have conducted a new survey among 684 students in 7 high schools in Liège, Belgium. To our surprise, if differences exist in the appreciation of politics for those who reject political participation, there are no differences when we compare social values. With the raise of new interest in politics among the youth, this is a call for further researches.

Résumé De nombreuses recherches ont montré que les adolescents ne sont pas intéressés par la politique et ne veulent pas s’engager dans les partis politiques. Par contre, ces mêmes enquêtes indiquent qu’ils appuient largement la participation dans des organisations pour la défense des droits de l’Homme ou de l’environnement (une participation civique, dirons-nous). Toutefois, ne garder que cette seule image ne permet pas d’illustrer les nombreuses interactions entre les participations et les intérêts de la jeunesse d’aujourd’hui. La présente communication vise d’abord à proposer une image plus complexe en comparant l’intérêt politique et la participation, puis, en comparant les valeurs des adolescents qui s’engagent dans une participation de type civique – et ces derniers ne sont finalement pas si nombreux : contestent-ils l’ordre social et économique actuel ? s’opposent-ils à la politique traditionnelle et comment ? À l’automne 2011, nous avons réalisé un sondage auprès de 684 étudiants dans 7 écoles secondaires à Liège. Si l’appréciation de la politique diffère chez ceux qui rejettent la participation politique, il est surprenant de constater que ces rejets ne se retrouvent pas au niveau des variables sociales du questionnaire. Avec les changements que l’on observe un peu partout aujourd’hui au niveau de l’engagement des jeunes, ces résultats appellent nécessairement de nouvelles recherches.

In recent years, a “soft consensus” seems to suggest that “young people” are indifferent

or even hostile to politicians and political issues. After all, regular surveys may support this

opinion: our research team has recently supervised an important survey which indicates that

only one third of the 16- to 21-year-old young people, in Wallonia and in Brussels Region, are

very or rather interested in politics (Dorzée, 2009). These results will not surprise specialists

of the issue (Muxel, 2010): only a minority of young people seems interested in “politics”

these days. However, we cannot say that the overall population is really more interested in

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politics either1. Indeed, if the general population does not appear overly interested, then why

should young people be as or more interested than their older counterparts2?

However, we also know that many young people are involved in social movements that

have some political relevance (just think of involvement in environment or anti-globalisation

organisations). For some commentators, this participation reveals a new form of politics, not

based on traditional political parties. The Canadian Network for Research in Public Politics

(www.cprn.org3) emphasizes researches demonstrating that the youth do not ignore the public

life or the politics but are very critical about the politician debates and are reluctant to take

part in political parties or other institutional participation. They are more active in mobilizing

social and political networks on line and out line, they use boycott and are doing volunteer

activities. Compared with young adults of previous generations, today’s youth are less

interested in the political process, mainly because of a feeling of being overwhelmed by the

complexity of the political system (O’Neill, 2007). Thus, it is likely that young people are less

aware of the relevance of elections and they do not consider that decisions of politicians

directly affect them (Bishop and Low, 2004: 6-8). So, is today’s youth “apathetic”, “self-

centred”, “individualist” or “preparing the new politics”?

Recent events in the world can draw a new image of the involvement of the youth, but it

is certainly to soon to see it. For the moment, the most recent data still shows opposite

attitudes regarding politics. This should not surprise us because of the large heterogeneity of

the youth. Like any other major sociological category, this concept does not constitute a given

naturally homogeneous group. The notion of “young people” encompasses very different

experiences which depend on the circumstances of the individual concerned: we all know that

“la jeunesse n’existe pas”, as a famous French sociologist said (Bourdieu, 1980). One image

cannot show the complex web of relationships on the various levels of participation and

1 In fact, there are also signs of rejection of politics among the adults (approximately one quarter of the adults are not interested in politics; only 10% are strongly interested in politics, according the European Social Survey. Seven European universities have undertaken this cross-country survey in 2004; the database and the methodological notes are available at http://naticent02.uuhost.uk.uu.net/, accessed on May 11, 2007. 2 Indeed, as we all know, any discussion of “youth and politics” is always informed by an image of the youth of the sixties, thus creating an underlying comparative perspective. Isn’t this generation largely considered as the golden age of youth involvement and controversial actions? But at the same time, this image immediately raises other questions: to what extent is it really relevant for comparison? Shouldn’t we remind ourselves that the sixties also had their share of conservative and non-interested young people? Shouldn’t we distinguish between organised activists, followers, interested people and apathetic ones, for the sixties as well as for any other generation? Undoubtedly, even if its political significance is real, approaching youth as a global reality can give us a hard time as political sociologists… 3 CPRN is no longer operating, but research materials are hosted by Carleton University Library.

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interest among today’s youth (Fournier, 2009).

Because of this heterogeneity – and this is a sociological fact we have to respect –, there

have been numerous studies that have thoroughly analysed the general values and attitudes of

young people 15 to 29 years old of age, including their specific responses to the current

political scene. Surveys, essays and sociological studies, all present this kind of paradoxical

portrait of young people in this domain. Given these basic features of young people’s attitudes

toward politics, it is perhaps not surprising that commentators have drawn virtually

contradictory interpretations if they do not take into account the diversity of attitudes in their

analyses.

The purpose of this paper is not to elaborate “a sociology of the individual” (Martuccelli

and de Singly, 2009), but nevertheless to suggest a more complex image of the interest in

politics. For this presentation, we will particularly deepen two dimensions. First, what is

today’s set of values of adolescents involved in civic participation: do they contest our present

social and economical system or do they share their core values? This is often what

commentators imply when they magnify the involvement in civic participation. But how is it

true? Are they so opposed to “traditional” politics and how? Second, as a large majority of

adolescents do not really participate but only indicate a will to do so, how can we be sure that

they do not take this position as a “safe haven”, as an “expected position” – as it is largely

expected to be cynical towards politics today?

Relying on the results of a survey done in the Liege area among 684 students in the fall

of 2011, we will create several clusters of young people using the most relevant questions

among 70 dimensions (political and social attitudes and behaviours) to provide a real

visualisation of the data as Torney-Purta and Barber suggest (2011). With those images, we

will compare each cluster with several socioeconomic variables in other to typify them and

determine if young people involve in civic participation are really developing other visions of

politics.

Sample and method

In the fall of 2011, we administered a questionnaire of 150 questions to 684 students in

Liège (French-speaking Belgium)4. The sample is composed of 39% of boys and 60% of girls

4 He surveyed students in classrooms in seven schools of Liège and its suburbs. Statistically, the sampling is not random but the selection of the schools and the classes was made following the social and cultural diversity of

4

(7 students did not answer this question, most likely by lack of time), of which two thirds are

aged between 16 and 18 years old (67%). More than half of the students (55%) belong to the

private school system (Catholic).

For the analysis of the data, we use two types of statistics. First, we use the Percentage

of maximum deviation. The “PEM” is a generalisation of the chi-squares analysis and allows

us to create indexes of tie between modalities of a contingency table (and not only variables

alone) and to construct profiles, set of modalities of response that are in attraction with a

specific modality (Cibois, 1993). The Percentage of maximum deviation permits also to build

styles of behaviour (or, in technical terms, modalities of variables which have a set of PEM

similar in a cross-tabulating with descriptive variables5). In conjunction with this statistics, we

will use the Hierarchical ascending classification – a variant of cluster analysis. It will divide

our respondents’ answers into clusters and those refine significantly the representation of

people for the analysis of survey data6. Such a synthesis of the information provides a

considerably enriched picture, since the structures or the clusters that are thus constructed

must be interpreted pluralistically and can only be understood by examining the differences

with other structures.

Interest in politics: The reality of a minority

As Table 1 indicates, only 33% of the students were strongly or somewhat interested in

politics in 2011. The table indicates no significant differences from the various surveys we

have done before (in 2007, for example), but students in 1990 were clearly less interested.

According to our data – and several replications we have done on this topic go in the same

direction – interest in politics is a reality shared by a minority of young people. Again, is it

surprising at this age (some of them aren’t even voting yet7)?

the region. Since the questionnaire was administered during school time, sometimes in the presence of the professor, the NA rate is quite low (with the exception of the last questions). On this regard, Annick Percheron posits that working with schools is often the one of the only possible and economical solutions for social science researchers if they endeavoured to reach a large number of respondents (Percheron, 1974). We are grateful to Jean-François Guillaume, professor (chargé de cours) at the University of Liège, who provided financial support for the survey. The results presented in this paper are still very preliminary and more analyses will follow to deeper our understanding of these indicators and their relationships. All suggestions are welcomed. 5 “Modalities” of a variable measuring political interest are “Strongly”, “Somewhat”, “Not really” or “Not at all”, for example. In the annex of this paper, a simple example explaining the logic of the PEM is provided. 6 Practically, we suppose 4 or 5 clusters, for example, in which are regrouped individuals with profiles more similar to others’. By no means using the term “similarities” is to suggest homogeneity. For more technical details, see Juan (1982) and Jambu (1989). 7 Voting is mandatory in Belgium at 18 years old, however.

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Table 1 Interest in Politics

(Liège, 1990, 2007 and 2011)

Are you interested in politics?

Strongly Somewhat Not really Not at all NA Interested in politics (1990) 4 14 38 43 0 Interested in politics (2007) 8 25 39 23 5 Interested in politics (2011) 9 23 36 31 1 N = 640, 1437 and 684.

But what do they mean by “interested in politics”? Even though this question is always

used in survey and seems quite straightforward, we certainly cannot take it for granted for this

study. Is politics referred to “traditional politics” (something that we know young people tend

to reject) or to the interest in “social issues”? And how can we qualify this “interest”?

A fruitful exercise can be done if we compare the interest in politics with the civic and

political participation (Table 2). Two elements can be noticed in this table: first, the low level

of participation (past or present) for political parties, but also for human rights movements (or

similar type of organisations, like associations for the protection of the environment – lets call

it “civic participation”). Second, for those types of movements, the large difference between

those who would like to participate or not. This has always been a relevant measure of

“political” participation (after all, at 16 years old, you can expect a low level of participation

in a political party8). Usually, for many commentators, this gap clearly indicates the rejection

of traditional politics in favour of the interest in a “new form” of politics.

Table 2 Participation among Young Liégeois (Civic Participation vs Political Participation)

(Liège, 2011, 16-19 years old)

Participant (present or past) Would like to Don’t want to Cultural Associations 47 19 34 Youth Movements 38 9 54 Leisure groups 27 27 45 Human Rights Movements* 10 46 44 Student Associations 9 23 68 Political parties 6 15 79 N = 684. * Civic participation.

8 Actually, this raises the question of the age to vote. In this perspective, we may think of lowering the age to vote to encourage more young people to be interested in politics. This is the idea that one of us has developed recently (Fournier, 2012a). See also the work of Eva Zeglovits and Martina Zandonella (2011).

6

But is it so simple? A more visual presentation of the data, if we crosstabulate civic

participation and political participation, is very informative (Figure 1).

Figure 1 Participation in Various Movements or Associations

(Liège, 2011, 16-19 years old)

Four categories emerged for a more complex picture9:

1. Almost 40% do not want to participate at all;

2. Almost 35% would like to have a “civic participation” in association like human

rights, for the protection of the environment, and so on;

3. Almost 10% would like to participate on both;

4. Almost 15% participate to one or another (line one and column one)10.

The attitudes and behaviour towards participation among young students in Liège are

modulated in those clusters. There is certainly a major block of students who reject the civic

or political participation. The majority is more divided: the division between students

interested in civic participation and the others is only relevant after we have excluded the first

group.

9 Even though, only two variables were used. However, their modalities were kept to create the web of possibilities. 10 To be complete, 4% want to be involved in political parties but not in civic participation (26 students). For the sake of the demonstration, we include them in the third case (although one can argue they should be included from the sample for this analysis).

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The same kind of demonstration can be done with those four clusters and the interest in

politics (Figure 2).

Figure 2 Interest in Politics vs Political and Civic Participation

(Liège, 2011, 16-19 years old)

With this figure, we are really able to say what is behind the notion of “interest in

politics”:

1. Almost a third (30%) rejects politics and civic and political participation.

2. A quarter (26%) rejects politics but would be interested to be involved in civic

participation. Note that it is only a possibility. We always have to be careful here.

3. Students who said they are interested in politics are not always the ones who are

involved. Indeed, as line one shows, they can be almost equally participants,

interested in participating in both, not interested in been involved in politics or even

not interested in participation at all!

4. Finally, a last group (11%) says they are not interested in politics but are involved.

The purpose of this presentation is not to show that students are not coherent with their

answers. On the contrary, those clusters show the polysemy of the “interest in politics”. It

shows that the civic and the political images of politics are mixed in the question “Are you

interested in politics” and that “interest” does not necessarily means “active involvement”.

8

Those distinctions are crucial if we want to propose and adequate image of the relationship

between youth and politics, at least with your data in Liège11.

A different vision of the world between students involved in civic and political participation

The second purpose of this paper is to compare the attitudes towards a series of political

and social values among students involved in civic and political participation. Other analyses

can be done with all students, and especially the no involved ones (Fournier, 2012b), but the

attempt is to contribute to the debate between the realities of two different kinds of

involvement among the youth, based on the rejection of traditional politics. Thus, only a

subsample is considered for this analysis, much smaller indeed: we have only kept students

who are involved in civic or political parties (past or present) – 92 students in total (14% of

the whole sample). We will use the PEM for the analysis of this subsample.

Of course, the sociological characteristics of this subsample are slightly different of the

whole: the subsample is composed of 46% of boys and 54% of girls, of which two thirds are

aged between 16 and 18 years old. 70% is in the general sector of education and more than

half of the students (54%) belong to the private school system (Catholic). 12% practice very

regularly their religion (they are Catholic). Table 3 illustrates the perceptions of students

involved in civic or political participation regarding the other time of involvement.

Table 3 Civic and Political Participation among Involved Students in those Associations

(Liège, 2011, 16-19 years old)

Civic and political participation 17% Civic participation and would like to be involved in political participation 12% Civic participation but would not like to be involved in political participation 45% Political participation and would like to be involved in civic participation 18% Political participation but would not like to be involved in civic participation 8% N = 92.

Not surprising, almost the majority of those participants were or are involved in civic

participation but would not like to be involved in political participation (45 %). It is not all the

students involving in civic participation who share this view, though. Also, less than one of

five students participates in both (civic and political). Between that, three possibilities show

the rejection or the interest between civic and political participation (see Table 3).

11 The participation is more frequent among older boys in the general sector of education. Religion plays also a role. Women are clearly the ones who would like to be involved in civic participation.

9

At first, the analysis was not so surprising and, in a way, disappointing (Table 4): using

almost 100 social and political variables, the Percentage of maximum deviation shows that

students who are involved in civic participation but reject the political one do have a negative

image of politics. For example, they believe more than the other groups that politicians do not

improve society. However, it is certainly interesting to notice that they also reject more than

the others different mechanisms of “socialisation to politics”, for example (they do not think

they should have more hours for understanding politics, they don’t have time to be more

informed, they do not feel concerned about governmental decisions). Those students,

involvement in “civic participation”, should be the ones with a open view about politics at

large: however, your data do not really should this.

Table 4 Highest “PEM” for Students Involved in Civic Participation but Would Not Like to Be

Involved in Political Participation and 98 Other Variables (Liège, 2011, 16-19 years old)

Variables Modality Count Deviation from indep.

Chi-square

“PEM” Local Chi-square Test

Should have more hours for understanding politics

Somewhat not/Not agree

37 6 1,080 59 % ***

Time to visit information Web sites Never 25 10 6,904 56 % *** Discuss about politics with friends Not often/Never 34 8 2,695 54 % *** Must be informed Don’t have time 15 6 3,806 54 % *** Concerned by governmental decisions Not often/Never 34 7 1,972 51 % *** Interest in politics Not really/Not

at all 27 9 5,059 44 % ***

Go to political conferences Never 22 7 3,617 40 % *** Politicians improve society Somewhat

not/Not agree 31 6 1,718 39 % ***

Immigration is good for economical development

Somewhat not/Not agree

28 5 1,157 30 % **

Trust unions Not really 24 5 1,491 24 % ** N = 41. For more information about the Percentage of maximum deviation, see the Annex. For the analysis, the PEM shows 10 significant relationships out of the 98 variables12. Dummies are used for each variable.

At the end of the list, two “social variables” distinguish the five groups of participants:

they concern immigration and unions and they express a relative conservative view. But all

they others (our society requests social changes, we can do what we want in society, the role

of parents, various generational issues, moral questions) are not significant.

12 For example, discussing of politics with friends; past or present participation to various movements, political or not; participation of parents; trust in various institutions; different social and political values: basically, a large part of the questionnaire was used for this initial analysis.

10

To be sure, we create a dummy for separate participants who were or are involved in

civic participation but would not like to be involved in political participation (45%) and the

others (who, in a way or another, accept or are involved in political participation). No

variables are significant, with the exception of the discussions about politics with friends and

the concerned by governmental decisions. So, we have to conclude that students involved in

political and civic participation are not so different13 - and perhaps not in the expected

direction, actually14.

However, if we use the result of the “PEM” in a correspondence analysis and then,

cluster this subsample, interesting results can be observed because our groups will be built by

the data and not taken as given.

Four clusters can be kept from the analysis. In order to describe them, we have only

considered the highest “PEM” values in Table 5. Clearly, the cluster D corresponds to what

we have seen previously: part of this subsample rejects traditional politics and are not fond of

the different mechanisms of political socialisation. This is not necessarily the same

individuals: among cluster D, only two third of them were civic participants and reject

political participation. Social reality is more complex that we would like to expect. But it is

certainly the most typify if we compare Table 3 and Table 5. Students who would like to be

involved in political participation are more often in cluster C; students who wouldn’t like to

be involved in civic participation are more often in cluster B. This cluster is also far more

“political” than the others. It represents 16% of the subsample (see Table 6).

Globally speaking, this last illustration is more instructive. The division presented in

Table 3 is sharp, but the clusters allow some fussiness with correspond more of the

interactions that students experience in the socialisation process.

13 Recent researches also show that those who participate in civic activities also tend to vote more then the others and do not necessarily reject traditional politics (Dostie-Goulet, 2009, 65). 14 Knowing, actually, that 53% of the people who reject political participation place themselves on the left on the left-right scale.

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Table 5 Description of each cluster with their highest “PEM”

(Liège, 2011, 16-19 years old)

Variables Cluster A

(10%)(1) Cluster B

(16%) Cluster C

(23%) Cluster D

(50%) Spend 30 min. or more on an info website(2) 100% Spend less than 30 min. on an info website 100% Go to conferences on political topics 100% Never go to info website 88% Not often/never concerned by governmental decisions 81%

Don’t have time to be informed 80% Strongly/somewhat interested in politics 78% Very often/often concerned by governmental decisions 71% Totally/somewhat agree that youth are concerned about social issues 71% Not really/Not at all interested in politics 69% Totally/somewhat agree that politicians improve society 67% Don’t trust elected people 63% Spend less than 30 min. on an info website 60% Never to conferences on political topics 58% Not often/Never discuss about politics with friends 58% Parents involved in demonstrations 56% Politics is not too complicated 55% Don’t trust politicians 54% Politics is too complicated 52% N = 91. Notes: 1. Cluster frequency.

2. Questions are dummies (where, for example, interested in politics means strongly or somewhat interested in politics.

Explanation: the “PEM” is a statistics for the explanation of large tables comparing several variables. In a way, it combines the information from the Chi-square and the Cramer’s V. The percent evaluates the maximum deviation for any modality, considering how much it deviates from a situation of independence (where a modality – or a cell – doesn’t bring any information because there is no difference) and the maximum deviation each cell could have contributed (the measure of intensity). Here, for example, the absence of participation to a human right association is very relevant to illustrate Type A because the maximum of deviation is at almost three-quarters (see annex for the explanation).

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Table 6 Civic Participation, Political Participation, and the Four Final Clusters

(Liège, 2011, 16-19 years old)

Cluster A Cluster B Cluster C Cluster D Civic and political participation 19% 25% 31% 25% Civic participation and would like to be involved in political participation 0% 0% 55% 45% Civic participation but would not like to be involved in political participation 5% 15% 17% 63% Political participation and would like to be involved in civic participation 24% 24% 24% 29% Political participation but would not like to be involved in civic participation 14% 57% 0 % 29% N = 91.

Conclusion

According to our data, the clear division between civic and political participation is not

so obvious. If we consider traditional politics, it is true that half of the students involved in

civic participation is really reluctant towards it. However, we expected a larger difference on

social values. There is some, but it is difficult to draw a real pattern here.

In the future, a larger sample, perhaps more diversified, could allow us to go further and

to confirm or not this first image. For the moment, we must stress the fact that our

presentation shows how it is important to consider the attitudes towards participation for

qualifying the interest in politics and to consider the web of attitudes on this issue. It is also

important to remember that civic and political participation is still the behaviour of a minority

in the youth, and even a minority with various relationships between civic and political

participation.

How the pattern we have presented will change with the recent involvements of the

youth? Only the future will tell.

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Annex15

In other to understand to statistics of Percentage of maximum deviation (“PEM”) on

which this paper is largely based on, we will give an example from Table 3: the Type A is

characterised by a PEM 69% for the absence of participation to a human right association. Let

us start with the crosstabulation of the original results:

Table 5 Participate to a human right association according clusters of social and political variables

(Liège, 2007)

Type A Type B Type C(1) Type D Type E Type F(1) Total Participate 9 26 0 79 42 2 158 Don’t participate 248 696 11 256 50 0 1261 Total 257 722 11 335 92 2 1419 N = 1437 (18 individuals were excluded because of none answers). Notes: 1. They were not analysed in Table 3.

If we have to calculate the PEM of the cell “Type A”/”Don’t participate”, we have to

follow those steps:

1. Calculate the local Chi-square (that is the theoretical distribution [257*1261/1419 =

228] and the observed distribution – this theoretical one [228-248 = -20]

2. Then, we are looking for the minimum value (because observed – theoretical is

negative) that we could put in the cell that would be compatible with the margins

(that is the minimum value of one of the two margins, in this case 257)16. Then, the

maximum deviance = maximum value – theoretical one [257-228 = 29] and the

PEM =

€

Observed −TheoreticalMaximum deviance X 100

or

€

248 − 22829 X 100

= 0,0069

3. The local PEM is expressed in percent.

15 This annex is an application based on the translation of Philippe Cibois, “Le PEM, pourcentage de l’écart maximum : un indice de liaison entre modalités d’un tableau de contingence”, Méthodologie Sociologique, no 40, September 1993, pp. 43-63. 16 In the case of a minimal value, it is usually 0.

14

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