"Den som skriker högst blir hörd" : En kritisk analys av gymnasieelevers politiska dialog

Sammanfattning: The focus of this essay is the civic engagement of Swedish upper secondary school students. In light of recent studies showing Swedish youth to be less politically engaged in comparison to other countries, and young adults as underrepresented in representative politics, a divide can be seen between the political world of the adult and the political world of youth. This essay aims to collect political experiences of young people, through the use of focus group discussions, in order to better understand the political interest of students as well as the schools work with civic engagement from a student point of view. By observing the political discussions of students through a theoretical lens of critical pedagogy as expressed by Peter McLaren and Paulo Freire, the purpose of the essay is to increase understanding of young peoples political praxis and of how they engage in politics at school. The main results of the essay indicate that students political focus is not primarily on issues of class and that the students express an individualized form of political activism. Furthermore the results indicate that students are able to participate in school decision making and that they are allowed to be political in a school setting but that political discussion is far from common in their school work.