Political and civic participation of young people in North Africa: behaviours, discourses and opinions

Abstract

This text introduces the special issue that examines the opinions and political behaviour of young people in the three Maghreb countries - Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco - over the last ten years, after the so-called "Arab Spring". The assumption is that, although young North Africans do not form a homogeneous category and may even defend antagonistic outlooks on society, there are underlying trends that structure this emerging generation. The contributions of this special issue are articulated around three main topics: the construction and the representations of Youth as a social and political category; the political attitudes of young people and their perception of their respective societies in general and of political actors in particular; and finally, on the conflict between, on the one hand, the recognition of their rights and spaces for civic participation and, on the other, their electoral disaffection as reflected by opinion surveys and official data. In other words, this special issue discusses the complexity of the rise of a new generation through their narratives and their practices.