Dalarna University's logo and link to the university's website

This study has a dual focus. Firstly, it analyses how digital media provide spaces for new and what can be seen as “non-conventional” forms of political participation where counterhegemonic discourses can be expressed. The paper explores these dynamics of political participation focusing on contexts where spaces for expressions of regime critique or dissent are restricted and counterhegemonic expressions come at a risk of persecution. The study aims at engaging with ongoing conversations about the complex dynamics of democratic exchange and political participation and the role digital media can play, particularly in contexts of such restriction of expression and associated risks. To this end, the study presents examples from the political participation of Angolan youth during the Angolan general election campaign and the general elections that took place in 2022. Secondly, it analyses the discourses with particular attention to the imaginaries of the future and the discursive constructions of who and what “fits” into the political projects. In so doing, particular attention is given to the dissonances between what is expressed in the discourses of the main political parties in the election campaign and those of the young Angolans in digital media spaces. The choice to focus on Angolan youth is motivated firstly by the growing population of young people, educated or not, who face, to different degrees, the lack of opportunities, different “blockages” to social mobility and a sense of despair about the future. Secondly, in Angola as in many African and non-African contexts new political dynamics have been attested to emerge, often outside the scope of institutionalized or partisan politics, triggering activism and other manifestations of political activity, including violence (Abbink, 2005, 2021, Van Gyampo, & Anyidoho, 2019).The research findings are based on the analyses of four data sets, namely, (i), discourses in ten international, national, and local communication channels over a ten-month period in 2022 (ii) the political programs of the two main political parties) and (iii) the demands of young Angolans, as expressed in digital social media and (4) a survey carried out on the eve of the elections 2022.The preliminary findings and results show that Angolan youth, although constituting a numerical majority, is largely excluded from spaces of democratic exchange in the sense ofbeing able to engage in the official political debate. Moreover, political programs present priorities that are directed to the most privileged layers and not to young Angolans who live in conditions of poverty and precariousness. Moreover, participation in the institutionalized or partisan politics is limited and seen as irrelevant. The study shows how the non-elite, nonprivileged young Angolan perceives him or herself to be marginalized from a socioeconomic point of view and, in their own in-group spaces, digital and not, express alternative imaginaries. This invisibility and the erasure of the demands of Angolan youth contributes to a perspective of an increasingly politically volatile situation.