The story of U18 began in 1996 in a Berlin youth club. The aim of the initiators was to arouse the political interest of children and young people. By engaging with political programs and people, participants should learn to question campaign statements, formulate their own interests, find political answers and shape their environment. The U18 extracurricular political education program is offered in almost all federal states.
Where offered, anyone under 18 can take part in the U18 election nine days before state and federal elections – and since 2014 also before European elections.
Strategy and communication consulting, development of campaigns and materials for the organization of the U18 elections as well as public relations work. The Berlin network also needed a user-friendly website to facilitate access to important information.
united communications has been advising and supporting the Berlin U18 network since 2005. We have relaunched the U18 logo, arranged media cooperations, successfully implemented various websites and multi-stage communication campaigns, including commercials for the U18 elections, patronage of the Children’s Commission of the German Bundestag, press conferences, discussion events with politicians and a postcard campaign to acquire members of the Bundestag as supporters. In general, many politicians from all parties spoke positively about U18, e.g. Dr. Angela Merkel, then Federal Chancellor and CDU Chairwoman, Dr. Norbert Lammert, then President of the Bundestag and CDU Member of Parliament, Klaus Wowereit, then Governing Mayor of Berlin and Deputy Chairman of the SPD, Cem Özdemir, then Federal Chairman of Bündnis 90/DIE GRÜNEN, Dr. Gregor Gysi, then Chairman of the DIE LINKE parliamentary group in the Bundestag.
The following figures illustrate what U18 has already achieved: despite the COVID-19 restrictions, the U18 turnout in the 2021 election increased by around 20% compared to the previous election. In Berlin alone, 47,614 people under the age of 18 cast their vote in 398 polling stations, which corresponds to almost 8% of all young people in the city. Nationwide, 261,210 young people took part in the election, which represents a significant increase in both polling stations and voter turnout and a new U18 election record.
A major success of U18 has been lowering the voting age so that young people aged 16 and over could also vote in the 2024 EU elections.
