Political participation cannot simply be measured in terms of electoral turnout. Discuss

The more traditional forms of political participation are party membership and doorstep canvassing. However, participation in these more orthodox forms has declined in recent years. Figures for electoral turnout, party membership and doorstop canvassing for a party are all down. These are signs of public disengagement from the traditional democratic process.

The sharp decline in more traditional methods of political participation such as electoral turnout and party membership in the last 30 years has been matched by the steep rise in pressure group membership. In 2009 for example the Royal society for the Protection of Birds had more than twice as many members as the three main UK political parties combined. This strongly demonstrates that political participation cannot be measured simply in terms of electoral turnout as it shows that the UK still has a politically engaged electorate albeit not in the traditional sense. Perhaps in a post-materialist age in which the majority of people live a much better life than their predecessors of yesteryear, what matters more are quality of life issues such as ecology and minority rights. Pressure groups arguably represent these causes more effectively than do the parties that contest the elections.

A further form of non-electoral political participation is engaging in political protests. A recent example of political participation through political protests is the student protests over government plans to raise tuition fees as a result of government education cuts. This demonstrates that political participation cannot simply be measured in terms of electoral turnout as the low turnout figures for young people at the 2010 general election, only 44% of eligible voters in the 18-24 age category voted, appear to demonstrate that young people are not politically engaged. However, this direct action of thousands of students shows that young people are participating in politics.

Therefore, it appears that political participation cannot simply be measured in terms of electoral turnout as the low turnouts in the 2005 (61.4%) and 2010 (65.1%) elections seem to indicate an electorate that is not involved. However, the rise of protest politics such as over fox hunting and government cuts demonstrate the need to measure political participation in less conventional forms.