Discussions about who should vote are intrinsic to a democratic system, as they determine who gets to make the choice about elected representatives or outcomes in referenda. Questions about the age at which people should be allowed to begin voting are one important dimension of these debates and have been for a long time. The 1960s and 1970s saw extensive discussions in many Western democracies about the reduction of the voting age from 21 or 20 to 18—and some countries have engaged with changes on precisely those dynamics more recently (such as Japan). However, more recently, countries in which there had been a decades-long consensus on the voting age at 18 began to contemplate whether an earlier enfranchisement at 16 might be more appropriate. While there are also other ideas being discussed, such as minimum tests for literacy and independent voting instead of a set voting age (see for example Cook, 2013), major policy and campaign discourses have been focusing on the question whether 16 may be a better age for enfranchisement.
Proponents and opponents of a lower voting age often present passionate arguments. This applies both to academia as well as parliamentary debates (see for example the discussions in the UK’s House of Commons, November 2017). Contentions often arise as the question addresses deep concerns related to issues such as citizenship (Tonge & Mycock, 2010) and therefore the foundations of how we understand the engagement of citizens with the state and its institutions. Indeed, many analyses, particularly those critical of early enfranchisement, initially engage with normative questions (e.g. Chan & Clayton, 2006; Electoral Commission, 2003; Hart & Atkins, 2011) before considering empirical observations to substantiate particular claims. Therefore, different investigations may not always be contradicting each other, even if they appear to do but they often start from different normative viewpoints, which makes it difficult to develop comprehensive evaluations. Furthermore, even when critiques are primarily based on empirical accounts (Cowley & Denver, 2004), comparisons between studies can be difficult because the foundations and underlying assumptions of different analyses often vary substantially.
This book therefore aims to bring together the research on the topic, both conceptually and, in particular, also empirically. We are now able to make use of an emerging body of data on case studies of countries where we do not have to speculate about what would happen if 16-year olds were allowed to vote but where we can actually observe what takes place. Voting at age 16 has been implemented at multiple levels, which allows us for further differentiation as well. While some countries permit newly enfranchised, younger voters to take part even in national elections (such as Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Cuba, Ecuador, Malta and Nicaragua), others have limited it to local or regional level elections (such as Estonia) or have only implemented it for local or regional elections in some parts of the country (such as Scotland in the UK or several states in Germany). Additionally, in some countries experimental trials have been conducted with a lowered age in some municipalities (for example in Norway) or been exacted locally through direct action (such as in some places in the USA), which provides us with further empirical insights. For the first time, we are now able to examine how newly enfranchised young people behave and view elections in a wide range of different contexts.
After reviewing some general arguments in the debate, the book proceeds in two sections. First, we present three chapters that engage with the conceptual debates related to the voting age in depth. In the second part of the book, we then engage with the new opportunity to utilize data on empirical studies from a range of different countries in eight case studies before concluding. By bringing together the currently rather disparate knowledge we have about observations of lowering the voting age in a variety of different contexts and at multiple levels, we aim to provide deeper insights into what the consequences of earlier enfranchisement may be. In doing so we are looking for shared patterns but also divergences between the different case studies to identify what other structures and processes enfranchisement may interact with. Any such endeavor, while providing very meaningful insights, will inevitably also raise new questions and we will suggest avenues for future, coordinated research to deepen our understanding further.
1.1 Key Contentions in the Debate on Lowering the Voting Age
The voting age debate tends to revolve around four general topics. There is, first, a debate about legal issues, and the relationship between the voting age and other age-limits that are defined by national legislation or international conventions. The second topic is whether a lower voting age may affect the political engagement of young people. Third is the issue of political maturity. Are 16-year-olds ready and able to get voting rights? The answer to that question may depend on the quality of civic education in each individual country. Fourth, what are the political consequences of a lower voting age? If the voting age is lowered, the electorate will be substantially expanded, and this may affect election outcomes, and in the long term it may affect policy.
From a legal perspective, a commonly argued point by proponents of a reduction of the voting age to 16 is that, depending on the country, there are also other citizenship rights or duties that apply at this age. However, critics argue that indeed there are many citizenship rights reserved for older ages (Chan & Clayton, 2006, p. 534; Cowley & Denver, 2004). Most countries define people below the age of 18 as children, in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Children are both de jure and de facto to some extent dependent on their parents or guardians. Opponents of a voting age below 18 therefore sometimes argue that children are not sufficiently free or independent to be able to exercise their voting rights. Reducing the age for something as important as voting may be problematic and ultimately inconsistent with broader understandings of democratic citizenship (Tonge & Mycock, 2010, p. 190).
With respect to the second topic, many critics present empirical evidence that suggests a lowering of the voting age may be harmful at worst and ineffective at best, in increasing political engagement. Many of these studies focus on observations of the existing youngest voter groups (commonly 18- to 24- or 30-year olds). These investigations indeed suggest that often younger people engage less with representative forms of politics than older people. Different studies have shown that younger people’s participation rates in elections had declined (Electoral Commission, 2003; Franklin, 2004).
However, there are substantial issues in relying on studies focused on slightly older young adults, when trying to deduce insights into the behavior of 16- and 17-year olds if they were enfranchised. In the early years of the transition into adulthood, there are many changes in the political attitude and behavior that we can observe in young people (Hart & Atkins, 2011; Prior, 2010) and those may not follow simplistic linear patters but reflect a complex set of contextualizing factors. Indeed, even among young adults aged 18–21 we can find substantial differences. 18- and 19-year olds have been shown to participate more in voting than their slightly older counterparts aged 20 and 21, which Bhatti and Hansen (2012) use to illustrate that we should understand voting as a social act, which young people are more likely to engage with, if they still live with their parents and which is more common the younger they are. This particular insight seems to extend to 16- and 17-year olds further. Several studies have shown that they tend to present a greater eagerness to engage politically than their slightly older counterparts (Wagner, Johann, & Kritzinger, 2012, p. 378) undermining the commonly held idea that interest and engagement with politics decreases continuously with age.
This raises an important question about the causality assumed in these processes. While critics tend to suggest that earlier enfranchisement will lead to a reduction in engagement (in a linear extension from the observation of young adults), proponents of lowering the voting age suggest that actually the degree of engagement in young adults should be understood as lower than it could be because of enfranchisement occurring too late. This is because early voting experiences themselves are habit forming (Dinas, 2012) and potentially distinct for 16- to 17-year olds. Empirically, Zeglovits and Aichholzer (2014, p. 356) indeed observe this after the change in the franchise in Austria where 16- to 17-year olds turned out in higher proportions than 18- to 20-year olds. A similar result could be observed in Scotland during the 2014 independence referendum, where 16-year olds were permitted to vote and turned out at a much higher rate than 18- to 24-year olds (Electoral Commission, 2014, p. 64). In addition to electoral practice, positive changes could also be noted in relation to political attitudes. In Austria, attitudes contributing to political interest were...