Yes We Can

The 2008 presidential election unleashed a potent new force in American politics. It is the Millennial Generation: Americans born since 1982, now age 26 and under. Politicians and pundits alike were surprised by the waves of young volunteers who manned the campaign front lines, phone banking, blogging, canvassing door-to-door, and organizing large groups of peers to do the same. Politics was suddenly cool, pushing Time to jump ahead of longtime favorite Cosmo as the most popular magazine on college campuses. Youth turnout in the primaries jumped dramatically--in many states doubling or more since 2004 while older adults showed only marginal gains. In the general election, Millennials turned out in record numbers for their age bracket and cast their votes overwhelmingly, by roughly two-to-one, for Obama. So decisive was their preference that, without it, the sizable 7 percent popular-vote margin for Obama nationwide would have been effectively erased. Not since the 1930s have youth had such a large quantitative impact on the national outcome.

Rejecting the pundits’ outmoded (Generation X) image of the disinterested and disengaged youth voter, these Millennial youth have now made their first major impression on American politics. This is just a prequel. In the coming decades, we predict they will become America’s next political powerhouse.

The emergence of Millennials on the national political stage is the latest chapter in a generational story that has already been building for many years. Over the past decade, parents, teachers, military recruiters, faculty and (most recently) employers have all noticed that Millennials have brought with them a very different set of attitudes and behaviors than the youth who preceded them: a confidence and conventionality, a preference for group consensus, an aversion to personal risk, and a self-image as special and as worthy of protection. The generation that has already transformed K-12 classrooms, the enlisted ranks, college campuses, and the entry-level workforce is now beginning to transform politics.

Who is this Millennial Generation? Cynical Gen-X slackers are giving way to a new kind of youth--civically engaged organizers like tweenager Talia Leman, recent guest on the Today Show, who used the Web to persuade middle schoolers across America to donate funds to build schools in Cambodia and provide clean water to African villages. The hard-edged Gen-X celebrities are giving way to a nicer, friendlier model, like teen icon Miley Cyrus, who recently threw a community service-themed “Get Ur Good On” Sweet Sixteen party. The Millennials are pressured and programmed. They are bonded to their parents and networked to their friends. They want the system to work and are eager to contribute. They are optimistic about their future. No one would have described young Boomers this way in the 1970s or young Gen Xers this way in the 1990s.

In 2008 there appeared several excellent accounts of how Millennials approach politics, covering mainly their policy views, their technology, and their organizational style. These include Millennial Makeover by Mike Hais and Morley Winograd, Generation We by Eric Greenberg and Karl Weber, and The Progressive Generation by David Madland and Amanda Logan. Our essay will focus more on the Millennials’ underlying beliefs and life priorities, on why they differ so dramatically from those of older generations, and on how this generation is likely to change the substance and tone of America’s political life for decades to come. A long-term perspective is important. We predict that Millennials over their lifetime will greatly strengthen the connection between citizen and community, between ordinary people and public institutions at all levels of government. By the time they reach the age of national leadership, they will forge a new social contract. Some generations tear down civic trust, and others build it up. Having watched so many of their elders tear it down, Millennials are poised to become a builder generation.

If history offers an example of a youth generation similar to the Millennials, it is the G.I. Generation (born 1901- 1924), who grew up in an era of tightening child protection and improving behavior, earning a reputation as upbeat, team-playing, and civic-minded youth. In their adult years, the G.I.s pulled America out of Depression, saved the world from fascism, unleashed nuclear power, founded suburbia, and took mankind to the moon. It may be that the Millennials will dominate the history of America in the twenty-first century just as the G.I.s have dominated the history of America in the twentieth.

To explain how the Millennial story could unfold, we need to appreciate what political generations are, how regularly in history they appear, and how they are shaped by their formative years and collective life story. Because most political scholars regard youth merely as an age bracket, they cannot account for sudden shifts in how people in their teens or twenties think and behave. By looking at birth cohorts aging through time--that is, by looking at political generations--we believe we can explain these nonlinear shifts.

Applying this method over the past twenty years has enabled us to make useful predictions about the behavior of young people and draw a detailed picture of Millennials as a generation-- all of which is recapitulated in this essay. Finally, we offer a detailed thematic overview of the Millennials’ political views, with special emphasis on views that are likely to remain unchanged as Millennials grow older.

One of our major conclusions is that Millennials think about politics in ways that cut across the “liberal” and “conservative” labels used by older generations. Another is that Millennials constitute a new political generation with attitudes towards politics, government, and social issues that today’s policy makers cannot afford to ignore. Already, they show early signs of becoming a political generation of unusual power that will strengthen civic trust, build national institutions, and forge a new sense of teamwork and optimism in American politics. As their influence rises, the Millennials are likely to translate these priorities into a new social contract, radically re-drawing the institutional connection between citizen and state.

See the PDF below to read the full report.