Dahl (1998) argues that one of the criteria for establishing a democratic process of
government is that all voting members of the democracy have “equal and effective
opportunities for learning about the relevant alternative policies and their likely
consequences” upon which they will be asked to base their votes (37). Even if they do
not take advantage of these opportunities, if our democracy is to function effectively all
citizens should be able to learn enough to allow them to vote in their interests. The
paucity of political information aimed specifically at young adults puts them at a
comparative disadvantage relative to other citizens.
Many recent studies and practitioner reports indicate that young Americans are
turning away from traditional sources of news (Mindich, 2004). In addition, those
between the ages of 18 and 24 are not going on-line for news to an extent that would
serve to compensate for their inattention to newspapers and television news sources
(Keeter et. al. 2002).
It is true that news consumption, particularly of newspapers and network
television news, has been declining for all age groups. A 2002 study by the Pew
Research Center for the People and the Press demonstrated that the percent of people who
report regular reading of a daily newspaper is down 8% since 1994, and the percent of
people who reported regular network news viewing was down 21% from 1987.
However, young people are less likely to be regular news consumers than their elders.
The same 2002 Pew study showed that 19 percent of those under 30 watch the nightly
network news regularly compared with 53 percent of senior citizens.
Certainly, there are many problems with the way traditional news sources present
information (Farnsworth and Lichter, 2003). Active consumption of news is not a
panacea for becoming an informed and engaged citizen. Young people do report getting
news about politics and current affairs from other sources, such as comedy programs
(Pew Center for the People and the Press, 2004). However, it is far too pessimistic to
assume that the only options available to young people for information gathering must be
flawed news sources that do not appeal to them or comedy shows that have no mandate to
inform.
News media organizations have an obvious interest in increasing the youth
audience but not necessarily in providing young people with high quality information
about politics and public affairs. Efforts to increase youth audiences by news
organizations generally include providing more entertainment coverage, shortening the
length of news stories and adjusting formal visual features to be more consistent with
“MTV Style” editing (Sherr, CIRCLE Working Paper 16, 2004). Although it is possible
that these changes will increase the youth audience, they run counter to the democratic
ideal of an informed citizenry.
There is no standard for how much information citizens need in order to vote
effectively. Many scholars have argued that citizens need to learn very few political facts
in order to make informed voting decisions because they can rely on heuristics such as
party affiliation to determine which candidate will best serve their interests (Popkin,
1991; Schaffner and Streb, 2002). However, increasingly young people lack sufficient
understanding of national politics to rely even on these cognitive shortcuts. This may
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Convention