Why countries do (not) lower the voting age: A mixed-methods study of conditions and processes

Abstract

Many countries around the world have successfully lowered their voting ages to 16 at either the local, regional, and/or national level. These countries have applied differing methods for their implementation process. Some have experienced a top-down process while others have experienced a bottom-up process. In this thesis, I investigate why countries lower their voting age – and why they don’t. I start with a literature review into enfranchisement reforms in general, and youth enfranchisement in particular. Based on this, I formulate expectations about the structural conditions for lower voting ages and outline possible actors and processes accompanying the adoption of voting age reforms. In the empirical part of the thesis, I first analyse the conditions most often associated with a lower minimum voting age through a time- series cross-national analysis of 141 countries between 1960 and 2022. Here, I find that majoritarian electoral systems, more elderly people in a country, a high degree of political polarisation, liberal democracy, and high degrees of regional authority correlate with lower minimum voting ages. I use these findings as a foundation to further explore the processes involved in the adaption of a voting age reform drawing on the case of Norway, where lowering the minimum voting age has been attempted, but rejected several times. Using six in-depth interviews and process tracing, I investigate the actors and negotiations in the Norwegian adaption process. I find that the Norwegian case exhibits both top-down and bottom-up tendencies throughout the process. The discourse in the Norwegian case is academic in nature, and primarily focuses on democratic participation and health on the pro-side, and normative legal arguments on the side against lowering. Critical actors in the top position of the responsible ministry were crucial for the trial elections held in Norway, by first pushing for them and later allowing the project to continue. Youth parties and organisations were crucial for both accelerating the trial election process, but also turning parties on the issue. I also find that political actors sometimes acted outside of party lines. I conclude that the Norwegian process failed implementation because of a lack of political will from political actors, and subsequently the Norwegian public.