Practices of Self-Exclusion from Political Participation Among Young Men

Gender gaps in political and civic engagement as well as in values or knowledge are one of the most traditional subjects of research when it comes to quantitative approaches to inequalities in political socialization. Surprisingly much less effort has been taken in qualitative approaches on researching gendered motives for political (in)engagement. The presentation will thus introduce an ongoing analysis of narratives of young men’s alienation from political engagement. It will be argued, that gendered patterns of justifications for political inactivity can be found. Further, the concept of ,self-exclusion’ – as suggested by works of Bourdieu (1977; 2010) or Willis (2016) – shall be explored in order to understand the male participant’s responses. Broadly speaking, the concept assumes, that people internalize beliefs of not being eligible to participate, while on the same time seemingly drawing back from participation voluntarily, or ,for good reasons’. As such, the concept helps explaining inequalities in the course of political involvement, and has since been elaborated for the target group of young people (Skrobanek 2007; Skrobanek/ Jobst 2010). These approaches shall be expanded for the specific case of young males refraining from political involvement. It shall be argued that the processes of self-exclusion that were found, function for the young people to maintain not only agency, but a specific form of male agency, upholding aswell as drawing on notions of hegemonic masculinity (Connell 2005). The work presented is based on semi-structured interviews with young people aged 16-18 having attended the non-academic tracks of secondary schools in Vienna. The analyses rests on Grounded Theory (Glaser/Strauss 1017). Literature: Bourdieu, P. (1977). Outline of a Theory of Practice (R. Nice, Übers.; 1. Aufl.). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511812507 Bourdieu, P., & Bourdieu, P. (2010). Distinction: A social critique of the judgement of taste. Routledge. Connell, R. W. (2005). Masculinities (2nd ed). Polity. Glaser, B. G., & Strauss, A. L. (2017). The discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for qualitative research. Routledge. Skrobanek, J. (2007). Perceived discrimination and (re)ethnicisation among young Turks and resettlers. Zeitschrift für Soziologie der Erziehung und Sozialisation, 27, 265–284. Skrobanek, J., & Jobst, S. (2010). Cultural Differentiation or Self-Exclusion: On Young Turks’ and Repatriates’ Dealing with Experiences of Discrimination in Germany. Current Sociology, 58(3), 463–488. https://doi.org/10.1177/0011392110364041 Willis, P. E. (2016). Learning to labour: How working class kids get working class jobs. Routledge.