engleski

Croatian Youth on the Political Margin

The starting point of this article is an understanding of the youth as a marginal social group, where political participation is seen as an indicator of the total marginal social status of the young. The hypothesis advocated here is that the Croatian youth is even more politically marginalized in the transitional period than during the communist regime. The founding of empiric research of youth and the attitudes of politicians toward the young, and the exact indicators of underrepresentation of the young in the Croatian parliament are, thus, presented in that context. Awareness of the political marginalization of youth, as was shown is almost generally accepted, but, at the same time, there are no indications that there might be a potential clash of generations in the Croatian society and politics. Hence the relationship between the age groups in Croatia has been recognized as a peevish inter-generational coexistence, which includes an uneven distribution of power between generations, in favor of the middle-aged population. We advocate the use of intra-party quotas (similar to the social regulation of political participation of women) as the most efficient instrument for enhancing the participation of youth in the political decision-making process. This could galvanize changes in social awareness, which is presently dominated by a lack of consideration for the young as full citizens.

Croatia; youth; politics

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