Australian youth-led activist organisations and the everyday shaping of political subjectivities in the digital age

Abstract

This thesis examines the relationship between youth-led activist organisations, digital media and youth political participation. Focusing on the Australian context, I ask: what are the contexts and conditions through which young people develop diverse forms of political subjectivity? Recognising that everyday activities and practices are formative for political identity, I find that young people's practices subtly""and sometimes not so subtly""contest what counts as 'legitimate' political participation. Drawing on Bakardjieva's (2009) theory of subactivism to study the relationship between everyday practices and political views and actions, I argue that young people exercise what I call 'quiet power': acts of everyday tactical resistance to established and legitimised modes of formal political action. In recent years, youth-led activist organisations have actively engaged young people, achieving ostensibly significant influence and reach, but they are under-researched. To understand how these organisations constitute new contexts for youth political participation, I analyse what role two such established organisations""Oaktree and the Australian Youth Climate Coalition (AYCC)""play in shaping young people's political concerns and actions and how they adapt to young people's changing participation preferences. As everyday, networked and personalisable forms of political participation are increasingly common among young people, both organisations deploy technology-based engagement strategies. While a burgeoning literature seeks to understand how young people's political practices are embedded in digital contexts, research has yet to focus in depth on how young people come to be interested in and to act on issues of concern. I therefore go beyond the study of practices to analyse young people's motivations: what interests and activities are meaningful to them and what conditions underpin this meaning-making process? I examine how their feelings, thoughts and activities in relation to political issues might manifest in more conventionally recognisable political acts.

Date of Award	2018
Original language	English