It is not at all clear that the left takes benefit says the researcher

After the riots in the suburbs and mobilization against the contract first engagement (CPE), the Centre for strategic analysis (General ex-Commissariat of the Plan) devoted today, a study day on ways to "make society in France and in Europe in the early twenty-first century". The opportunity for this body responsible for public action, to analyse the crisis of participatory democracy, through the prism of the young, main actors in the events of November and February-March-April.

The crisis of the suburbs and the revolt against the CPE denote a withdrawal, rejection, or rather a renaissance of youth policy For Olivier Galland, Director of research at CNRS, "sudden fever movements are the reverse of the weaknesses that usually prevails."

"Of the practical concerns.

In relying on data from European surveys on the values of youth, the researcher finds in France, more than in other countries of the European Union, observed, since 1981, a double movement: the decline of the classical politicization (interested in politics, talk, and, eventually campaigning in a party) and the strong growth of the political protest (involved in strikes or demonstrations). Olivier Galland makes two assumptions: considering the challenge as a new form of action policy not calling into question the content, or the intensity of political commitment, either considering that it reflects a growing distance between youth and society.

This second interpretation appears to have preference: according to him, the debate at the European referendum between the President of the Republic and a panel of young people illustrated "generational shift" and "dialogue of the deaf" between, on the one hand, "General and generous ideas" and, on the other hand, "of extremely practical, concrete and localized concern." According to him, finally, being poorly explained, measures aimed at young people are only feed "instinctive mistrust" for political and economic elites. In total, "it is not certain that the mobilization, which the political dimension was quite low, has an impact any on the youth vote.". "It is not at all clear that the left takes benefit", says the researcher.

Electoral demobilization

Focusing its analysis on the inhabitants of cities, and in particular on young people of 18-35 years, Cécile Braconnier, lecturer in politics at the University of Cergy-Pontoise, interested, she, the reasons for the demobilization of this population, which has long been "more participationniste" elections that the average national. A demobilization happening, according to her, less by the abstention by the non-inclusion or the "evil registration" on the electoral lists. Among the explanatory factors, it cites the "lack" of young people in the cities with the policy, including the part of those who maintain a "confrontational relationship social order" for which voting is a "trick of bourges", of "bouffons". This indifference is double, according to her, "distrust" or a "distance" for a political offer regarded as foreign to their concerns, hence, a contrario, the good results obtained, in some districts, by Christine Taubira in 2002, and by the Euro-Palestine elections list 2004 European.

Disappearance of activism

But Cécile Braconnier in is not there: it refers to the disappearance of forms of popular sociability, such as advocacy, fellowships of tenants, street parties, etc., who previously played a "major role in the mobilization"; It also insists on the transformations of the world of work and, inter alia, "the insecurity and unemployment which are escape any part of the youth of the cities to salaried work that was once structuring." Finally, it cites the developments of the family unit: in addition to the divorce, with frequently the withdrawal of the electoral process, the parents of the cities, because they did not have the right to vote, have less tend to encourage their children to exercise their right.