From the Streets to the Ballot Box: How Youth Organizing Impacts Voting-Related Attitudes and Behavior

• In Event: The Power of Youth for Communal and Educational Change

Abstract

This study illuminates the relationship between youth organizing and electoral politics, drawing on interview and focus group data with 144 participants involved in climate justice or gun violence prevention organizing. Initial findings suggest that voting varies considerably in its degree of centrality within specific organizational theories of change. This variation cuts across both movement and organizational lines and appears to be associated with two factors: a) the perceived scale of the problem(s) groups seek to address, and b) the centrality of community-based organizing and engagement to their work. Individual’s attitudes towards voting as a vehicle for social change vary according to the relative place of voting in their organization’s theory of change. This research raises implications for youth voter turnout.

Authors

• Jerusha Osberg Conner, Villanova University

• Johnnie Lotesta, Appalachian State University

• Kristen Jeanne Oshyn, Tufts University

• Joanna Timmerman, Eastern University