In the lead up to the 2025 Federal Election, we’ve been speaking to first-time voters to better understand their experience as they prepare for the polls. Our Voter Voices vox pops found that first-time voters are facing a variety of different challenges. Although some felt prepared, we saw a large majority expressing feelings of uncertainty and nervousness, while others voiced a complete lack of interest as soon as the election was mentioned. Many were unsure of who to vote for and were overwhelmed at the thought of staying informed on party policies. Some even said they found it easier to just vote the same as their family.
But why are first-time voters struggling to engage in Australian politics? To investigate this further, we spoke to an array of people working to lift the barriers facing the new generation of voters.
Finley Watson is a PhD candidate in politics at La Trobe University. He has written articles for news outlets like The Conversation and The New Daily, covering issues such as misinformation and political media. His current research focuses on the politics of new media, where he explores how political influencers affect voting behaviours and shape political news. He says that politicians engaging with influencers have become a “pretty important fixture for political communication and the broader media ecosystem” and that we are seeing elections increasingly attempt to involve influencers in their communication and their campaign strategies.
One Australian study found that nearly half of Gen Z voters primarily vote to avoid a fine. Why do you think there is so much disengagement amongst young voters?
I think there are a lot of issues going on, [such as the] cost of living crisis. In some of my research on the broader media coverage of the election, the sort of mainstream coverage has tended towards issues which don’t necessarily concern younger voters as much. Obviously, the cost of living is important, and it’s probably somewhat of a distraction.
We’ve also seen a massive swing towards defence as a kind of major issue that’s about 10 – 11 percent of the total front-page coverage. I think a lot of younger viewers are probably disconnected because there’s increasing economic inequality, increasing cost of living pressures. I think they’re probably finding that a lot of mainstream and established sources don’t speak to their particular perspectives and interests quite as much.
Why do you think that there’s been such a rise in political content from influencers this election?
I think on the one hand, it’s probably indicative of a broader shift in the media ecosystem, people increasingly get their news from social media, not just from influencers, but on these platforms, more broadly.
I think secondly, the US election probably had a bit of an influence and perhaps provided a bit of a model and some inspiration for Australia’s political campaigns. We saw Trump sit down with quite a wide range of political influencers on podcasts, including Joe Rogan, who, of course, as everyone knows, is the largest political influencer, our largest broadcaster in the world at the moment. We also saw Harris attempt to engage with quite a wide range of influencers, sitting down with Alex Cooper from Call Her Daddy. The Democratic Party more broadly invited around 200 influencers to its national convention last August.
So, a pretty strong push from US politicians to engage political influencers, looking at their increasing social capital. And I think Australian politicians and campaigners probably observed that similarly, and have begun attempting to include them in campaigns. Even before the campaign necessarily kicked off, there were a couple of dozen influencers invited to the budget lockup, just a couple of weeks before the election was called. And we’ve sort of seen efforts by both mainstream news outlets, including SBS and the major parties themselves, to integrate these influencers into their campaign. Probably attempting to engage, particularly, younger audiences given that I think Gen Zs and millennials are now the largest cohort of Australian voters, for the first time in any election.
You work across both US and Australian politics. Do you find that people know more about US politics?
I think that the US influencer ecosystem is a bit more developed, and I think a lot of Australian users probably have an influence in the political influencer scene over in the US, leading to larger audiences in the US.
I think in Australia, some people are definitely interested in Australian politics, but again, their sort of discussion and influence from influencers tends to be a little bit more widely spread. There’s less kind of really large singular influencers in Australia than there are in the US. So, definitely our audience probably skews a little bit towards the US.
And do you think that political influencer content is filling a gap for young people? Has it made them feel more engaged?
Yeah, absolutely. Political influencer content is a lot more directed towards specific types of people; it’s a lot more entertaining, it’s a lot more reflexive, and it ultimately provides a kind of guide for people who are perhaps unsure or unable to interact with every aspect of the media ecosystem. Given there’s so much going on at all times, political influencers, I think, provide a bit of a way of sorting through that broader ecosystem, developing trust, and again, provide some more refreshing perspectives for especially younger audiences as well.
What kind of things do you think could help bridge that knowledge gap and engage more young people in politics?
I think new communicators such as influencers do fill that gap to some extent. I think what we will probably see in the future is political parties having to gear their policies much more towards younger voters.
We’ve seen in the last week or so of the campaign, a little bit of a shift in policies to cater towards younger voters. We’ve seen the Labor Party announce several policies related to HECS and cost of living measures, specifically targeted at younger voters. We’re seeing The Greens increasingly look to bolster their support and target policies towards younger voters. But I think it’s a shift that the major political parties haven’t necessarily noticed or been very successful in understanding or capturing so far. So, I think it’ll be a broader shift in the media and political ecosystem, which will come to bridge that gap over time.
Politics isn’t always accessible for young people. In some high schools, they don’t offer politics as a class, and students have to go outside to source it. What kind of things do you think could be done to make politics more accessible, so people have more confidence when going into elections?
I think more accessibility in schools is probably a really important aspect. I know personally, one of the first high schools I went to didn’t have any politics courses. I know it’s not a consistent subject that’s always available. So, I think that’s probably a really important one.
And I think, again, a shift in the information ecosystem to make politics accessible, to encourage young people to think about the issues which really affect them.
Going back to the broad media coverage; we’ve seen defence, negative gearing, and tax policies, which just really are not applicable to younger voters at all. So I think both the major parties – and minor parties as well – will have to start having a think about which issues matter towards younger voters.
I also think that climate change has been one which has sort of begun to engage younger voters to a much greater extent. We saw that School Strike 4 Climate has been kind of consistently going on for some time. So, I think that has definitely helped, but I think the more that political issues really resonate with younger audiences, the more that younger people will start to engage in politics.
Is there any advice you would give first-time voters trying to become more politically engaged?
I would suggest to expand their informational ecosystem as much as possible, to think about the issues which concern them, but also don’t concern them. [Think about] issues that concern their community members as well. So, I would say, people should do their best to understand the broadest range of issues, even though that can be quite a challenge.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
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Photo: Supplied by Finley Watson and is used with permission.
