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Youth Political Participation: Sample of Sirnak
JOURNAL OF YOUTH RESEARCHES
Motivation:
Youth programs and volunteer activities are also influential in creating re-
sponsibilities for young people, communicating with adults, acquiring new skills, ex-
pressing themselves better, and building social awareness about participation as well
as political participation awareness (Wood et al., 2009: 300-303). The permanence of or-
ganized programs enhances voluntary participation while developing social dialogue with
non-governmental organizations and public institutions (McFarland and Thomas, 2006:
421, Yates and Youniss, 1998: 500-501). Farthing (2010: 188-190) presented an empirical
study on the ways that young fun political forms of action can be incorporated into the
practice of cultural leisure in order to increase the political tendecies of young people.
While young people prefer to be away from contemporary political unrest, music is more
involved in non-traditional political participation, such as organizing dance events, sym-
bolic actions and protests. The application of non-traditional forms of political participa-
tion in new social movements provides for the creation of communication opportunities
where more inclusive and comprehensive discussions of politics take place. Education
provides opportunities for exploring alternative ideas about the community, building sol-
idarity networks, decision-making and planning for future actions especially in Australia,
Canada and Britain (Wilkinson and Mulgan, 1995: 99-100). In Şırnak City Center, young
people have the motivation to increase participation tendencies when they have a good
youth organization (mean of item=3,22). Young people were aware of their rights to par-
ticipate in the electoral process (mean of item=3,57) and tended to participate in social
media campaigns (mean of item=3,30).
Communication Channels:
Local governments use the political participation of young
people as a bridge to achieve their political system goals. In addition, Civil Society Or-
ganizations and city councils serve this purpose in the business association with local
governments (Özer, 2011: 55-57). Media and communication channels also have an im-
portant impact on the creation of political awareness (Rashid and Gao, 2012: 186). Be-
cause the media is a resource for young people to learn about various political events, a
misconceptualization shows that young people who use remote media and communica-
tion channels have a greater awareness of political events and are closely interested in
political events of the recent past (Bakker and de Vresse, 2011: 458-460). The participa-
tion in civil associations as well as the access to the media and communication channels
can also lead to information sharing. More importantly, non-governmental organizations
can encourage trust and co-operation and, with the help of development projects and
they can encourage young people to acquire leadership qualities in political parties in the
future and to engage more with politics, democracy and citizenship issues (Rashid and
Gao, 2012: 186). It may make the political participation of young people more possible in
the future, include the voting of members and create the sense of belonging that political
parties will develop (McFarland and Thomas, 2010: 8-9). However, main communication
channels such as public institutions and organizations, NGOs and local governments that
