<p>This thesis is about the effect of political efficacy on societal participation among youths aged 15 to 29. It takes a starting point in the gloomy view of the decline of political participation among citizens in the western world, especially pointing out youths as a threat to democracy. This is a broad subject to take on so my aim becomes a bit more specific. The aim of the thesis is therefore to investigate if belief in ones own capacity and in the responsiveness of the political system affects the actual participation among youths in Europe, independent of a set of alternative predictors. Moreover the thesis is divided into two sub-investigations, one qualitative and one quantitative. The qualitative part discusses and analyzes the concept of political efficacy in a new and broader way outlining two dimensions of the concept, internal and external political efficacy. Using the modified definition of political efficacy the quantitative part provides an analysis of the effects of internal and external efficacy on societal participation among youths. This analysis is done in three steps. First four theoretical groups are derived from the two dimensions of political efficacy and then these are analysed against a set of control variables and three forms of societal participation, lawful public demonstration, contacting a politician or public official and buying a product for certain political, ethical or environmental reasons (“buycott”). Secondly a set of logistic regressions are performed analysing the effect of each dimension of political efficacy on the three forms of societal participation controlling for six alternative predictors (the control variables). Lastly the effects of each dimension of political efficacy are compared to see if different dimensions of political efficacy affect different forms of societal participation. The result shows that it is primarily the internal political efficacy that has effect on societal participation; there are significant results of the logistic regressions on all three forms of participation. As for the external political efficacy it only appears to have effect on “buycott”. However the model for the regressions did not show significant model-fit for the analysis of lawful demonstration. The main conclusion is that both dimensions of political efficacy affect societal participation but it is hard to say whether the different dimensions clearly affect different forms of participation.</p>

This essay studies what is affecting the Swedish people’s trust in the country’spoliticians, police and legal system. This was done by conducting multiple regressionanalyses in SPSS, using the Swedish survey data from the 2016 Europen Social Survey.To determine what is affecting this kind of trust, this study used Caroline McEyvoy’sdefinition of political efficacy from her studies of people’s view on the EuropeanUnion. The theories being used are Robert Putnam’s definition of the social capital,deriving from his studies in Italy and the United States, together with Ola Listhaug’sand Arthur Miller’s theory on how people’s evaluation of the government’sperformance affects their political support.The results show that people’s trust in Sweden’s politicians, police and legal system is,to a varying degree, significantly affected by their political efficacy, social trust andreligious attendance. Across all instances people’s evaluation of the government’sperformance were found to have the strongest effect.

This thesis is about the effect of political efficacy on societal participation among youths aged 15 to 29. It takes a starting point in the gloomy view of the decline of political participation among citizens in the western world, especially pointing out youths as a threat to democracy. This is a broad subject to take on so my aim becomes a bit more specific. The aim of the thesis is therefore to investigate if belief in ones own capacity and in the responsiveness of the political system affects the actual participation among youths in Europe, independent of a set of alternative predictors. Moreover the thesis is divided into two sub-investigations, one qualitative and one quantitative. The qualitative part discusses and analyzes the concept of political efficacy in a new and broader way outlining two dimensions of the concept, internal and external political efficacy. Using the modified definition of political efficacy the quantitative part provides an analysis of the effects of internal and external efficacy on societal participation among youths. This analysis is done in three steps. First four theoretical groups are derived from the two dimensions of political efficacy and then these are analysed against a set of control variables and three forms of societal participation, lawful public demonstration, contacting a politician or public official and buying a product for certain political, ethical or environmental reasons (“buycott”). Secondly a set of logistic regressions are performed analysing the effect of each dimension of political efficacy on the three forms of societal participation controlling for six alternative predictors (the control variables). Lastly the effects of each dimension of political efficacy are compared to see if different dimensions of political efficacy affect different forms of societal participation. The result shows that it is primarily the internal political efficacy that has effect on societal participation; there are significant results of the logistic regressions on all three forms of participation. As for the external political efficacy it only appears to have effect on “buycott”. However the model for the regressions did not show significant model-fit for the analysis of lawful demonstration. The main conclusion is that both dimensions of political efficacy affect societal participation but it is hard to say whether the different dimensions clearly affect different forms of participation.

This study examines high school students' experience of a political role play in social studies. The purpose of the thesis is to investigate which abilities role-playing games develop for students and through this contribute to the social studies didactic research of experience-based teaching that reflects reality. The ambition of the thesis is to understand whether the effects of role-playing as a teaching method for the learning of political skills are experienced as useful for their role as citizens. Through a digital survey, the students in this study answer questions about their perceived development of their political self-confidence, their political abilities and whether the role-play motivates effort, which in turn answers the question of whether political role-play in social studies is effective for students' self-governance in society. The result shows that the political role-play has beneficial effects for most of the surveyed students development of their political abilities. The students in the study feel that their political self-confidence has increased and that the teaching has benefited their understanding of dissenting views. The result also shows that large parts of the student group have made an effort, which shows that they experience the effects of the teaching as useful in their future role as citizens. / Denna studie undersöker gymnasieelevers upplevelse av ett politiskt rollspel i samhällskunskap. Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka vilka förmågor rollspel utvecklar för elever för att bidra till den samhällskunskapsdidaktiska forskningen av upplevelsebaserad undervisning som speglar verkligheten. Ambitionen för uppsatsen är att förstå om effekterna av rollspel som undervisningsmetod för lärandet av politiskt förmågor upplevs som nyttiga för sin roll som medborgare. Genom en digital enkät svarar eleverna i denna studie på frågor om sin upplevda kunskapsutveckling av sin politiskt självtillit, sina politiska förmågor och om rollspelet motiverar till ansträngning, som i sin tur ger svar på frågan om politiskt rollspel i samhällskunskap är effektfullt för elevers självstyrning i samhället. Resultatet visar att det politiska rollspelet har fördelaktiga effekter för de flesta av de tillfrågade eleverna i sin utveckling av politiska förmågor. Eleverna i studien upplever att deras politiska självtillit har ökat och att undervisningen har gynnat deras förståelse för oliktänkande åsikter. Resultatet visar även att stora delar av elevgruppen har ansträngt sig vilket visar att de upplever effekterna av undervisningen som nyttiga i sin framtida rollsom medborgare.