Youth Political Participation And Democratic Engagement In Kenya: The Case Of Nairobi County

Abstract

The youth are important stakeholders in the democratic processes of any country. This study sought to examine the relationship between youth political participation and democratic engagement in Kenya with Nairobi County as the case study. The study was guided by two objectives: examining how (1) resource factors and (2) attitudinal factors influence the democratic engagement of the youth in Nairobi County. The study was guided by the civic voluntarism and attitudinal theories of political participation. The study employed the cross-sectional research design and the target respondents were divided into strata according to the administrative units in the county. Data was collected through the use of survey questionnaire with a sample of 392 respondents filling out the study questionnaire. Analysis was done through the use of the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software. The study established that resources influence the democratic engagement of the youth. Education level and time were found to have statistically significant (p-values of <.05) strong positive correlations with democratic engagement while civic skills had a statistically significant association in organizational membership among the youth. With regards to the second objective, the study established existence of very strong positive correlations between external efficacy and democratic engagement while the correlations ranged from very weak to very strong positive when it came to internal efficacy. Social Media efficacy was found to have a statistically significant association (p-values of <.05) with involvement in political content creation via social media platforms. Political interest on the other hand had correlations ranging from very weak negative to very strong positive with specific acts of democratic engagement. The study recommends that relevant stakeholders come up with innovative and creative ways of developing the political interest of the youth through involving them in edutainment activities and also find means of building up the civic skills of the youth for their meaningful engagement in democratic processes requiring civic skills utilization. Youth-led and youth-centric organizations also need to constantly engage the youth on political issues at the community level as a way of increasing their levels of political efficacy beyond the electioneering period.