German elections brought success to the right – both the Chadeck CDU/CSU and the extremist AfD have importantly improved their performance. The youngest voters, to the surprise of many, kidnapped socialist Die Linke – the organization received support from all 4th individual under the age of 25, while its overall score did not exceed 9%. The success among young socialists is due to a successful campaign, during which they have made a decisive decision against the AfD, presenting a consistently progressive and social alternate with slogans specified as "trans people exist, billionaires should not exist".
For Die Linke it is simply a breakthrough consequence due to the change in the structure of her electorate. Until now, the post-communist organization has mostly been a haven for energy pensioners, now it primarily represents urban youth. It happened that Die Linke received more votes overall, but never had specified support among the youngest voters. On the another hand, as far as the left is concerned, in this age group, it won more than half the vote, which is not an exception on the continent.
European youth inactive choose left
There are many similarities between the results of last year's parliamentary elections in France and the last in Germany. In France, the utmost right was comparatively successful, but it is not peculiarly due to young people. The support of the RN (and besides the AfD) among the youngest voters was akin to that of the general population – otherwise it was at the other end of the political scene.
W Germany's youth sympathy was gained by Die Linke, and over the Seine left-wing coalition, which picked up almost half of the vote among French under 25. This was the main origin of power of the fresh People's Front, which in the first circular of the vote won a full of little than 30% of support. At the same time, the trend in the fresh presidential elections was confirmed erstwhile Jean-Luc Mélenchon won in the first circular in the same group, despite failing to make it to the second round.
In Italy, in turn The triumph of the left among young people brought the last European elections. Although the ruling right has in full received a akin consequence as in the 2022 national elections and thus retained its advantage, the preference of younger voters is simply a origin for concern. The first 3 Italian elections before the age of 30 were opposition parties, and the Italian brothers Prime Minister Meloni landed in 4th place, with 14 percent support. They were preceded by the centre-left Democratic Party, the populist 5 Star Movement and the green-socialist AVS, with a combined left-wing score of as much as 54%.
It turns out that in the 3 largest EU countries, young people clearly preferred leftist parties or coalitions, greatly inflating their results, which were not all very impressive. Neither in France nor Italy nor Germany are nationalist successes driven by the sympathy of 20-year-olds. Based on the utmost right in Poland or Spain on the youngest voters is not a rule, on a European scale it is closer to an exception.
Left-wing childhood disease?
An interesting example is the United Kingdom, where support for victorious Labourers was decreasing with age. In western Europe, it is rather popular (or was) to believe that young people are naturally more inclined to choose the left, but this is simply a fleeting and aged large part of it will change its political orientation. In addition, akin sentiments appeared in Poland, e.g. in Piłsudski's attributed words, that "he who was not a socialist in his youth will be a boy of a bitch in old age".
However, the electoral preferences of young people were very different and sometimes predicted political phrases in the general population.
For example Italy The generation entering adulthood in the 1970s and 1980s seemed to confirm the above thesis by voting for communists, but already at the turn of the century the youth of that time were seduced by Berlusconi and now the same generation is the backbone of the electorate of Meloni's right-wing coalition. In France in 1981, the first choice of young people was the Communist Marchais, in 2002 Jean-Marie Le Pen.
Progressive and conservative youths combine the selection of more extremist groups. The erstwhile prefers Die Linke and France Incumbent from SPD and PS, the second vote more for AfD and RN than on CDU or Republicans. In this respect, the current opinion on the radicalisation of young people is true. Only that in the largest European countries it is primarily the left, and the times of over-representation of young people in the far right electorate seem to go back. However, it is besides early to open champagne at the office of progressive parties, as these are victories in the presently least influential age group.
Why Youth’s Voice Means So Little
Even a brief analysis of fresh past will clearly show that, in principle, elections are not won by young people. The NFP does not regulation France despite the support of half of them. In 2019, Corbyn's Labourers won almost two-thirds of the votes cast by the youngest part of the electorate, which did not prevent them from being defeated. Why specified a low translation of youth preferences into real election results?
The main problem is the number of young voters, and there is simply a demographic origin here. Europe is ageing, for example Italy or Germany are among the countries with the lowest levels of natural growth in the world. In the fresh elections in Germany, ca. 6.5 million 20-year-olds and over 11 million sixty-year-olds, and those entitled to vote at least seventy years old are even more – almost 14 million.
Another origin of weakness of youth electorate is election absenteeism. For example, in the French parliamentary elections, just over half of the eligible young people voted, while 4 out of 5 pensioners voted, providing a solid consequence to the macronists, despite their weaknesses in all another age groups.
The success of the left or right among young voters so depends mainly on the effectiveness of mobilising the unconvinced, who have never yet voted for anyone and feel loyalty to conventional parties like many older citizens. In western Europe, it is usually the left that this art is better done, mostly by addressing the issues of surviving crucial to young people, leading the housing crisis and mediocre working conditions. The problem is that although getting the support of young people is simply a good forecast for the future, it will not be adequate to win – many years will pass before the present 20-year-olds can vote for the generation of their parents or even grandparents.
