PSM leader KS Bawani (picture above) told FMT that the party’s latest statistics reveal that from January to July this year, about 300 youths had joined the party.
Admitting this may be a small number when compared with other parties, Bawani said it was important to take into account the fact that PSM was a much smaller party.
“Every month, 10 to 20 youths have been joining the party, mostly through online applications.
“Every year, there is a 20-30% increase in the number of youths we have,” she said.
PSM secretary-general A Sivarajan told FMT it was a good sign that most of those joining PSM are youths.
Speaking to FMT, political and social analyst Wong Chin Huat, from the Penang Institute, said what was happening to PSM was also happening in other parts of the world, including the US and France.
“In the US, you have Bernie Sanders, who was gaining popularity earlier on. In France, you also had Jean-Luc Mélenchon,” he said.
Sanders describes himself as a democratic socialist and a New Deal-era American progressive. He is pro-labour and emphasises on reversing economic inequality. Many scholars consider his views to be more in line with social democracy.
Mélenchon founded the La France Insoumise in February 2016, a left-wing populist and democratic socialist political party in France.
“You do have people who sort of revolt from the mainstream party, partly because of that sort of backlash from globalisation, where people find their interests are not being taken care of,” Wong said.
Wong, however, admitted that there were also local factors that could have contributed to PSM’s popularity among the youths, including the realignment that seems to be happening in the two more prominent coalitions: Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Harapan.
“Friends become enemies, enemies become friends. This is not necessarily a bad thing but parties have not done enough to convince their supporters about why this needs to happen.
“So, there are people who get a bit confused, a bit disillusioned and think of these parties as traitors and harbour all kinds of other sentiments.”
He said another factor could be that PSM has been seen to be doing more ground work, often without any electoral benefit.
“If you compare PSM with other parties, they do not talk about seat negotiations and all these kinds of things.
“For PSM, it’s partly because they’re not in a coalition. So, even if they want to talk about seat negotiations, they’re unable to.
“This is also a party that has a very strange rule that if you want to run as a candidate somewhere, he or she has to be someone who has been working at the place for no less than two years.
“Instead of looking at a place and thinking about who has the likeliest chance to win, these are people who say that — in principle — we cannot run in some constituencies even if people might want us there if we have not served in the area. And that’s actually something.
“You see this party often taking up issues with no electoral benefit.
“You see some of these cases they are fighting for and a lot of them are not easy cases. They may not be in their constituencies but they will take it up … anywhere.
“All this sends the message that this is a small party; they might not do big things, but they are different. I think this attracts some people.”
Wong also suspects that the largest number of youths joining PSM are the Malays.
“If that’s true, then there is sort of a disillusionment among the Malays.
“Some of the Malays are going towards PPBM as well, which is a new party but that’s more on the right. All these things show that it’s partly global and partly local.”
Bawani confirmed Wong’s suspicions, saying that about 40% of the youths joining PSM were Malays and the majority of them were from the Klang Valley.
Meanwhile, political analyst Awang Azman Pawi, from Universiti Malaya, agreed with Wong that youths, globally, were looking for something different.
“The rebels among the youths want something different and something that holds high life ideals,” he told FMT.
“They understand that socialism speaks a lot about the welfare of the people and equality. This attracts them as they’re also attracted to issues concerning the conflict of power which leaves the people as the victims.
“Socialism seems to be the alternative of the day and many youths are looking for identities and the best models to be their guides even if their historical understanding of socialism might be limited.”
He said the fact that PSM members looked like the average Joe on the street was also attractive to the youths.
“Just look at (PSM chairman) Dr Nasir Hashim himself. He’s a humble man who lives a simple life, but is a highly intellectual individual.
“While PSM may not have as many supporters as BN or Pakatan, Nasir has his own style and his own stance. The youths like that.”
Distrust of politicians one factor for low number of young voters