Media is belittling millennials for the current overall decrease in civic engagement. They are criticized for their apparent lack of responsibility, political knowledge and reluctance to get involved in current affairs, and social media and the Internet have been regarded as contributing to this civic decline. Millennials choose more liquid forms of organizing, as they have uprooted from pre-established and stable collective identities. There is a change in generations and their activities, and millennials’ use of social media for both political and civic engagement is a growing research field now. Hence this thesis aims to determine how civic engagement has been redefined by new media and generational shifts. The Internet has been proven to entice citizens to thoroughly engage in politics, providing a framework for broad social participation, which is inherently democratic, becoming a potent tool for civic and political participation, a crucial motivation for the core constituency of movements. According to the theoretical and empirical material, with the emergence of new media, new concepts, such as online activism, have been materialized or old ones, such as simple protests, have simply shifted and adapted to current times. There is not a discontinuity but rather a redefinition of civic engagement. The findings of the current study are significant in this sense, as they support the theoretical concept of the reinvigoration of civic life through generational shifts and the rise of new media.

This thesis explores the conditions for perception of a person-organisation (P-O) fit between Generation Z (Gen Z) and employers in a talent acquisition context. The study is based on the presumption that the perception the candidate gets of the employer is based on the employer’s brand and vice versa. To explore these two actors' brands, personal- as well as organisational attributes identified in a literature review were used and a mixed method was adopted. The employer brand of six audit and accounting services firms and what they value in a future employee was explored through semi structured interviews. Furthermore, the personal brand of Gen Z business students and graduates and what they value in a future employer was explored through a questionnaire with 157 respondents. Based on the data, a discussion on the subject of P-O fit was conducted. Overall the results of the study both support previous research and add to it. The results indicate favourable conditions for Gen Z to perceive a P-O fit towards employers regarding four of the six identified organisational attributes. Additionally, favourable conditions were indicated regarding employers to perceive a P-O fit towards Gen Z regarding four of the seven personal attributes identified.

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