Friday, May 8, 2015
1PM, Harry Crowe Room (109), Atkinson

Dennis Pilon
What about the children!’ versus ‘The kids are alright’: Why the media and political science are getting youth politics wrong”

The media are regularly peppered with concern about young people and politics. Political scientists regularly blame young people for declining voter turnout in elections. It is claimed that today’s youth are either callow self- indulgent post-adolescents, too pampered to take life seriously. Or some claim that everything is fine and youth are just expressing themselves politically in new and novel ways. Both views are wrong, and wrong in politically damaging ways. This talk will set out different framework for understanding youth politics and the decline of youth political participation, one that makes sense of the economic and social factors influencing what is happening with them. It will also offer some concrete proposals to redress this state of affairs.

Dennis Pilon is Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies in Political Science at York University and the author of the widely praised Wrestling with Democracy (2013). Dr. Pilon’s published work has focused primarily on issues of democratization and democratic reform but he also has a broad understanding of federal and provincial politics in Canada and the working of democratic systems in western countries. He has published extensively on these subjects.