Apathetic or Engaged? Exploring Two Paradigms of Youth Civic Engagement in the 21st Century

The majority of academics studying the field of civic engagement would concurrently agree that there is a decline in conventional forms of civic engagement, such as voting, keeping informed with current affairs, or membership in civic organisation, especially among young people. However, disagreements begin when advocates for traditional forms of engagement discount evidence of new, evolving patterns in youth civic engagement. Reviewing literature on civic engagement, this paper offers an examination of the congested debate on the ‘two paradigms’ of youth civic engagement, the disengaged paradigm and the engaged paradigm.