Talk or something more? COVID-19 and youth discourses of participation
ISSN: 1443-9883
Article publication date: 4 May 2023
Issue publication date: 8 November 2023
Abstract
Purpose
Political participation of young people has been examined, but there is a lack of research about how these participation forms are interpreted and what counts as participation for young people. The study aims to identify discourses of political participation in Hungary, where the COVID-19 restrictions during 2020–2021 have confined young people's everyday interactions and political activism to the online space for an extended period. The authors’ asteroid-effect hypothesis suggests that new discourses of political participation have become more widespread, which may have reinterpreted the previous dynamics between online and offline participation.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors analyse the results of six focus groups and eight interviews with young people conducted between 2021–2022 through discourse analysis.
Findings
The qualitative results show that to intellectualise the everyday discourses of youth political participation, extending its classical theories is worthwhile. While online participation has not emerged as a paramount, positive interpretational framework, a new discourse of political participation has emerged, making conversation a fundamental act.
Originality/value
While the results are limited to Hungarian youth, the strong appearance of participation as a communicative action can have consequences to theoretical approaches of political participation. The authors believe that COVID-19 restrictions had a significant role in this change, because family talks became more politicised.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors received no financial support for the authorship and publication of this article. The research is related to the High-risk Post-COVID project (2021/19) of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.
Citation
Szabó, A. and Déri, A. (2023), "Talk or something more? COVID-19 and youth discourses of participation", Qualitative Research Journal, Vol. 23 No. 5, pp. 485-500. https://doi.org/10.1108/QRJ-02-2023-0031
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited