An exploratory analysis of Japanese voters who are reluctant to participate in politics

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Due to the recent trend of declining turnout, an exploratory analysis was conducted using data collected from other study to examine voters who are reluctant to participate in politics. One thousand respondents were divided into three groups based on their willingness to vote : a group with higher willingness to vote as the Willing group, a group with lower willingness to vote as the Unwilling group, and a group without manifestation of their attitudes as the DK group, and those in the latter two groups were defined as voters who are reluctant to participate in politics. There was no difference between the Willing group and the Unwilling group in the degree of expectation that individual efforts would improve society and in sense of internal political efficacy (both low). However, the Unwilling group was significantly lower in the appraisals of living under a democratic government and choosing leaders through free elections. Those who were reluctant to participate in politics tended to be younger in age, non-regular employees, with fewer years of education. They, especially in their 20s and 30s, did not show their attitudes even toward the policies which may have negative consequences to their own lives. This suggests that the reluctance of these voters to participate in politics may be caused by their lack of awareness of the possibility that their uneasy situation of life can be improved through their political participation.

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