The department interviewed a hundred residents aged 18 to 29. The objective: to understand their vision of France, the proposals they consider important to address during the campaign as the first round of the presidential election approaches.
>> 18-30 year olds and politics: Generation 2022
Anaïs is 22 years old, she has just started her own business in the book business, but is having trouble finding an apartment. The question of housing is, in his view, not sufficiently taken into account by the candidates: “They don’t offer anything concrete. They touch on it a bit, but it’s not at the heart of their concerns. And even less so for young people, when we often don’t have full-time jobs, fixed salary, but the politicians talk about it very little. Maybe because they weren’t concerned with this problem, they don’t know how hard it is.”
The impression of not being taken into consideration is also the feeling of Ambra, this 21-year-old student who lives in Drancy. She fumes at the refusal of several supermarkets to employ her as a cashier: “I was refused because I had no experience, but at my age you can’t have any! I think companies have to adapt to young people, they have a lot of talent and values, but they are not yet discovered.”
Environment, condition of women, access to studies or employment… The priorities are not the same for everyone, but they find themselves on the feeling of not being listened to by the political world. It is also for this reason that Floyd-Idriss, in training in the building, does not intend to vote in this presidential election, disappointed by the candidates: “Many of them have unrealistic, utopian programs, they give hope to the people to do nothing at all.”
“None of the participants interest me because none offer something for young people.”
Floyd-Idrissat franceinfo
However, we must not confuse abstention with depoliticisation, believes Sabri, 22, a resident of Aubervilliers: “In a certain sense, the fact of not going to vote is to be politicized! Young people are fed up with being served the same thing for so many years, or we will be present on Facebook, Twitter or even TikTok to make them believe that we are interested in them, but in the programs almost nothing stands out.
He already has his idea of the ballot that he is going to slip into the ballot box, which is far from being the case for all the young participants.
The young people of Seine-Saint-Denis and the presidential election: report by Noémie Bonnin
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