T

he youth are a significant group in the next elections. From the population of 241.13 million in 2011, voters aged between 16-30 years old comprised 25.69 percent of eligible voters. With the growing number of young people, youth participation in elections provides them with an opportunity to shape the nation'€™s relatively young democracy.

The young can be divided into the politically unconscious and the conscious. The first group lacks knowledge and understanding about the political system, like the electoral process and profiles of candidates competing in the elections. These young people tend to perceive politics as something irrelevant due to lack of political education.

Political engagement is regarded as useless, because it will not directly affect their daily lives. Most have low educational levels and insufficient access to various media that provide political information.

All this causes political apathy in young adults and leads them to throw their vote away. Some are persuaded to vote for incompetent candidates, who have low credibility, and offer less convincing programs, but gain much popularity from an intense media
campaign.

The second group of youth is politically knowledgeable. They mostly have a high level of education, and sufficient access to various media. Most became familiar with politics in their professional life, either as journalists, academics, youth activists, civil servants or NGO professionals.

Many of the politically conscious young people are voters who abstain from voting, known as golput (golongan putih, or '€œwhite group'€). They are disappointed with how money politics dominates the elections. They also lack respect for winning candidates, who often fail to deliver programs to improve public welfare. These young people believe that political engagement can do little to fix
multiple problems.

There are young people who do have faith that the election is relevant to them and that their voice matters. These smart young voters often conduct research on the credibility and programs of candidates competing in the elections.

Problems arise due to the relatively small proportion of smart young voters, particularly those participating in the elections. In the last 2009 elections, for example, turnout was 70.99 percent in the legislative election, and 72.09 percent in the presidential election, according to the General Elections Commission (KPU). There were an estimated 30 percent of voters who stayed at home; it was believed the more critical youth were included in this figure. Since elections are the backbone of democracy, youth interest in being educated voters needs to be encouraged though it cannot be forced.

Given fears of insufficient political knowledge particularly among the young, political education is urgent. Schools could teach students about the essence of elections, that a future leader is elected by considering his or her capacity, credibility and programs and should be open to evaluation.

Dissemination of political information should be widened to reach the lower-middle class youths in urban and rural areas. Various strategies to increase youth engagement in elections should be undertaken, such as visiting schools, holding dialogues in public places and targeting social media.

But young people'€™s mistrust and lack of respect for the political system can only be recovered by fixing the system itself. With free and fair elections and reliably elected leaders, the young people'€™s trust will eventually return.

With the growing number or young voters who abstain from voting, and less smart youth participating in the elections, the next legislative and presidential elections may see the rise of more weak candidates '€” not very good news for our democracy.

The writer is executive secretary at LabSocio at the School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Indonesia, in Depok, West Java