Zohran Mamdani’s recent victory in New York lit up the internet with celebration. His success offers hope for a new global left – young, outspoken, and unapologetically grassroots. Yet, while his campaign showed the power of authenticity and inclusion, it also demonstrated how easily democracy can slide into fandom. New York’s newly elected mayor quickly became a viral sensation, celebrated not only for his political agenda, but also for his charisma, aesthetic, and online presence. In the Unites States, where parties behave like sports teams and politicians tour like popstars, this dynamic is familiar. But as social media enhance this model, Europe should be wary of its side effects. Turning politics into a spectacle risks eroding accountability and the critical thinking that sustain democratic life – especially if we import this political style into electorates that are already drifting away from meaningful democratic participation.

As we start to see the first European examples of US-style personality politics with names like Zack Polanski in the UK and Rob Jetten in the Netherlands, we should remember that improving politics is a matter of educating better voters, not idolising better politicians. To foster citizens who can critically engage as informed participants, strengthening civic education and embedding political analysis into school curricula should be a policy priority.

Claiming that Mamdani won thanks to charisma alone would be painting an inaccurate picture. His success was also built by addressing the lack of representation most New Yorkers felt on the issues closest to them. From freezing rents and building rent-stabilised housing, to making buses free and raising minimum wage, Mamdani’s campaign struck home; and when finally confronted with a candidate that was willing to meet them at their level, the city’s electorate proved capable of political mobilisation with a record-breaking turnout of over 2 million votes, more than 1 million of which cast for Mamdani. But did his voters really stop to understand what their champion was promising them?

While experts have declared Mamdani’s proposals are feasible, many have also noted that they will be tough to enact, and tough to enact quickly. The mayor does not have unilateral control over rent increases, nor does he hold the power to freeze them. The Metropolitan Transit Authority – controlled by the state, not the city – has shown aversion to the free-buses program, as fare revenue comprises 19% of its bus operation budget. The ambitious plan to raise minimum wage to $30 per hour by 2030 is also dependent on Mamdani’s lobbying abilities, as a minimum wage beyond the state-mandated number cannot be established unless a specific law permitting city-specific salary increases is passed.

In America, the political landscape is increasingly shaped by the social media logic of algorithmic amplification, shortened attention spans, and emotional identification over deliberation, making policy nuance secondary. In this environment, political figures who are rhetorically sharp and culturally relevant enjoy structural advantages. In Europe, Zack Polanski and Rob Jetten are early signals of this model crossing over the pond – and while this is not inherently problematic, danger can arise if we lack the civic infrastructure to absorb this tonal shift safely.

European policymakers often misdiagnose democratic fatigue as a problem of trust or communication. Low turnout, volatile voting patterns, and institutional scepticism are met with campaigns encouraging participation or efforts to “simplify” political messages, but these responses treat symptoms rather than causes. The deeper issue is that citizens are asked to vote on complex issues in systems they were never taught to understand. How many of our students finish their schooling with a concrete, exhaustive understanding of what a parliament does, how budgets are negotiated, or what trade-offs are involved in policy making?

The point is, we cannot expect citizens to participate in democracy fluently without ever teaching them its grammar.

While civic and political education already exists across Europe, it is often fragmented, symbolic, or inconsistent. In some countries it is dispersed across history or social studies and even where it is a stand-alone subject it frequently focuses on values rather than skills, or on abstract rights rather than real political processes. Too often it is treated as secondary, theoretical, or optional, leaving young people exposed to political content online without the analytical tools needed to assess it. Effective political education should equip students to analyse competing perspectives, understand institutional constraints, and recognise misinformation. It should teach how power operates, how decisions are made, and why compromise is intrinsic to democratic governance. In an age of polarisation, these are democratic essentials.

Schools are a strategic lever. They remain one of the few institutions that reach nearly all future citizens, regardless of background, at a formative age, before political identities harden and disengagement sets in. Once civic education is embedded in curricula and supported through teacher training, its impact compounds over time, strengthening democratic competence generation after generation through one single reform.

From a policy perspective, this also makes civic education a good investment. It does not require building new institutions but enhancing existing ones, and compared to the long-term costs of political polarisation, declining trust, and democratic backsliding, the return is considerable. On the other hand, the costs of neglecting it are already showing: where political understanding is weak, populism thrives. Simplistic narratives outcompete nuanced debate, and charismatic leaders thrive without being meaningfully scrutinised. Democracy becomes procedural rather than participatory – a performance to be consumed rather than a system to uphold.

Mamdani’s victory should therefore prompt a deeper reflection in Europe. While his success is inspiring, European democracies should channel this political energy without turning politics into a spectacle – and to do so, the solution does not lie in copying campaign styles or cultivating political idols, it lies in classrooms. Strengthening civic education is not an idealistic aspiration; it is democratic statecraft.