Beyond Party Lines: Millennials Revolutionize American Politics

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The Millennial Generation. The first generation to grow up with the Internet, widespread cell phone usage, and Facebook. A truly "plugged-in" generation. Some people claim that Millennials (b.1982-2003) think of nothing but themselves and how many text messages they have received in the past five minutes. As unimpressed psychologist Jean Twenge puts it, "Millennials are the most narcissistic generation in history." Surely, today's self-obsessed youth, with their ipods and compulsively updated Twitter accounts, have nothing in common with their civically-focused grandparents and great-grandparents, those people who gracefully saw the nation through the Great Depression and World War II--right?

Wrong. In fact, striking parallels exist between the Millennials and the G.I. (a.k.a. the World War II or "Greatest") Generation. Not only do they both come of age during economic upheaval, but they also face global violence of epic proportions. In place of Nazis, we face Islamic extremists. A potentially nuclear Iran replaces the silent threat of the Soviet Union. As a result of this constant encounter with crisis during youth, both generations place a high value on active participation in government and take their civic responsibilities seriously. The civic spirit of the G.I.s drove the nation through the Great Depression and then propelled it through the Second World War. Hopefully,, the Millennials will handle the current economic crisis with such grace. So what does another civic generation mean for America's political future?

Before making such ambitious political predictions, the Millennials' place in the broader generational cycle of American politics demands analysis in order to properly frame this discussion. What does "civic" mean in a generational context? And if generations such as the Millennials and G.I.s embody civic responsibility, how do other generations fit into the historical picture? William Strauss and Neil Howe's Generations: The History of America's Political Future, 1584-2069 (1991)provides an excellent foundation for the examination of political cycles through a generational lens. These political scholars present a compelling interpretation of America's past, present, and--most importantly--future. They detail a four-part generational cycle where a distinct identity--Idealist, Reactive, Civic, or Adaptive-characterizes each stage. This cycle, they argue, has recurred (with the defining generational identities in the same order) with only minor exception since the British settling of North America.

Consequently, this generational cycle dictates a remarkably consistent political pattern in American history. Idealists come of age during a "spiritual awakening"--most recently manifested in the form of hippies, Vietnam protests, the Women's Liberation Movement, and John Lennon--during which they passionately challenge societal and cultural norms (Generations 35). Inevitably, a social upheaval follows this "awakening," and it is during this time of societal turmoil that Reactives are born and growing up. A few decades later, Strauss and Howe explain, Civics come of age during some sort of secular crisis--think "war on terrorism" and the current economic crisis--while Adaptives are being born. Strauss and Howe, then, refer to Idealist and Civic generations as "dominant" in the public sphere: Idealists reshape the moral and cultural worlds, while their civic counterparts rebuild institutions and develop new technology (Generations 35). Millennials clearly fit into the "civic" category. Growing up during a secular crisis? Check. Rebuilding (and more importantly developing) technology and institutions? Check, and hopefully even more so in the furture. Currently, America is in the middle of the Millennial Cycle, with the Baby Boomers labeled as the idealists, Generation Xers as the Reactives, and the Millennials as the civics. Because the G.I. was the last civic generation (during the Great Powers Cycle), the examination of that generation can potentially predict the behavior of the Millennials. What about the "Greatest" Generation made them great? How did they collectively persevere in the face of extreme crises? How will the Millennials' response mirror that of their generational predecessor?

A genuine concern for the state of the nation will spur Millennials to actively participate in government. Inevitably, the first step in active participation is education: knowledge of current affairs and policy issues. Unlike the politically disillusioned and cynical Generation X preceding it (Generations 333-334), the current generation of young people has an overall faith in the positive potential of politics. Fortunately, the advent of the Internet, along with its technological progeny (e.g. the I-phone) makes political awareness and knowledge all the more accessible and convenient.

Many political scholars believe that increasing awareness of issues (often facilitated by the Internet) will lead to a depolarization of sorts. As successful businessman and philanthropist Eric Greenberg explains in Generation We, Millennials will see beyond traditional partisan politics as usual. After extensive research, one will conclude that, rather than moving specifically to the political left or right, the Millennial Generation will affect U.S. politics in an entirely different realm together: issues, rather than party loyalties, will primarily determine how someone votes in a given election. Party ideologies will become secondary to a pragmatic interpretation of specific policy issues, and thus party affiliation will no longer serve as the crucial factor in predicting voting behavior. The Millennial "pragmatic policy voter" will dominate American politics. This voter will educate himself politically, prioritize issues on the basis of magnitude of immediate relevance, and then vote on the basis of which party purposes the most practical, logically sound solution to the given problem. For instance, in the 2008 presidential election such a voter would have voted primarily on the economy. Therefore, the two parties will still powerfully exist but with a severely weakened ideological base. A new breed of "independents" will come to fully dominate the American political scene--a truly revolutionary political phenomenon.