About 16% of the voters in GE2015 will be in the 21-29 age category.  In our IPS survey of GE2011, younger voters tended to rank the Internet as influential on how they voted more than other segments of voters. Hence, it is again likely that in this GE, material that is pushed out by friends and contacts will shape impressions of the politicians and their views. They are more likely to refer to views generated by third parties, friends and contacts, rather than the formal material put out by the parties.  If they had the time and bandwidth, they would probably be the ones going to rallies and watching rallies being streamed ‘live’.

The younger voters, like better-off upper-middle-class professionals, also are more likely to believe that it is important to have opposition representation in Parliament as a political ideal.  Parties are not likely to benefit from any long-standing affiliation among the younger voters obviously, so it would have been important for them to act in a way as to forge fresh bonds with them; to engage them. Millennials do believe that history does begin with them, that they can be history-makers, so politicians who make that appeal will certainly draw their attention.

One final point: because they are willing to think afresh, while our younger voters in affluent Singapore are not likely to admit that personalities matter to them, they will also pay as much attention to what sorts of policies the parties stand for, the rationale for their policy orientation and how these speak to them. They value quality engagement, tolerance in the midst of diversity, social inclusion and other post-material concerns like heritage, animal welfare, the arts, and green conservation.  This is what we see on the ground day-in and day-out – the enthusiasm of Singaporean youth about these issues, so parties they identify as speaking to these will also be attractive to them.

Dr Gillian Koh is a Senior Research Fellow at IPS. View her profile here.

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