Increased voter turnout due to young men: poll

A spike in the number of younger men who decided to cast their vote in recent EU Parliamentary elections is the likely reason for the success of the Pirate Party (Piratpartiet), a new poll shows.

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At the same time, participation of older voters decreased, according to a post-election poll by Synovate.

“We are seeing entirely new voting patterns in this EU election, where the youngest voters participated to a much greater extent than in previous elections,” Nicklas Källebring, an opinion analyst at Synovate, told Dagens Nyheter (DN) newspaper.

In previous elections, men and women have had equal participation rates, but this year, men's voting rates increased from 37 to 49 percent.

Among women, voter turnout jumped from 38 to 42 percent. In total, 46 percent of eligible voters went to the polls.

The Synovate poll also shows major differences in the success of various parties in mobilizing voters.

Only 40 percent of those who support the Social Democrats participated in the election, which is still an increase over the previous election with a turnout of 37 percent.

Among the supporters of the Green and Left parties, participation increased significantly. Among the other parties, the Christian Democrats were among the least successful at voter mobilization. Only around a third of the party's supporters voted, compared to almost half in the 2004 EU parliamentary elections.

Among the alliance parties, the Liberal Party (Folkpartiet) and Centre Party were most successful at getting their supporters to the polls, and the participation rate of the Moderate party's supporters increased from 46 to 55 percent.