Political Identity (Week 9-14) Flashcards
What is political identity
Political scientists are interested in group identities. More so how political identities impact behavior, and even more how behavior depends on other peoples identities
Different Identities
1) ethnicity: visible, race, hair, skin
2) Religion (personal) : Not always visible, only sometimes
3) Nationality: Depends on other identities and is inherently political.
Variation in identities
1) the nominal (groups) people belong to
2) The level of diversity in that group
3) Strength of identification of that group
4) Tolerance, do you tolerate another group
5) Support for identity based on political movements
WEIRD World Stands out for:
relious and religously diverse, but not very natioinalist and ethnically intolerant.
How are identities created: theories
Constructivist: The idea that identity is based on fact and is somewhat fixed.
Allows for identity to become the dependent variable
which identity is activated is based on choices.
But there is also the primordialism: Identity is fixed, the identity you are born with is the one you will forever have.
Gellener on the Emergence of Nations
What is a nation:
In order for there to be a nation people must:
1) Have a shared group/identity such as religion.
2) But that is not enough, shared identity is not enough. People NEED to believe that they deserve their own state, their own governing body over them.
Pushes back on nationalism, the fact that their nation has always existed.
Nationalism as a Political Tool: Gellener uses nationalism to:
create a sense of identity
create sense of attachment with ruling class
How nationalism creates a :we”
social identity theory:
value attachments to group,
part of pride and self esteem
we care for an in group member support them
labeling people as community soothes us
social identities helps during crisis
psychological soothing a feeling of belonging
ego boost
solves collective action problems when distrust is presentH
Hierro and Rico: effects on economy of nationalism
assign frames (wording to control who is at fault and who they blame for crises)
asses impact on nationalism on people with low SES in Spain
1) pride
2) nationalism
3) identification
results:
after looking at people with low SES having the option to blame the EU made them feel better about being Spanish, they now have a reason to know why they are poor.
rich people did not care because they are rich, but poor people did because they have someone to blame other than Spain.
Social identities and Boundaries
group identities invade boundaries with national identity, boundaries are clear because they are legal.
Sarah Goodman: Variation in WEIRD policies of immigrant intergration
not interested in cross sectional, but under what conditions do countries become liberal?
she looked at her DV: Membership requirements and her IV’s: existing citizenship policy and political pressure to change policies.
results: germany from restrictive to liberal
UK liberal to restrictive
Where do Goodmans IV”s come from?
voter prefereces.
there are different reasons for immigration policies to change:
a) political rhetorical
b) politics responds to voter preference’s
c) politics responsive to overall culture
d) no connection
Kristina Simonsen: okay but, how do we draw these national boundaries? How do natives think of national inclusion?
2 views:
ascriptive: things we are born with: religion, skin, birthplace
attainable: what you can do to learn: language, citizenship
results: immigrants sense of belonging depends on how the people in that country perceive immigrants, integration policies do not matter.
1) History matters no matter what
2) natives opinions matter
3) policies dont
Out group attitudes
2 stances:
opinions are fixed since birth
opinions can be shifted
Theories
contact theory: contact w out groups improve their relationship
vs conflict theory : contact w out group worsens
Jonathan Hamola and Margi Tavits: Heterogenous effects of contact
not that contact is good or bad, but that contact work for some people but not others (conditional effects)
conditionality of contact depends on political views: Used interaction model
1) Contact (IV)
2) measure of peoples ideology
3) interact both variables
results: show that when republicans and democrats are shown, whether or not republicans have contact they are still threatens by immigrants vs
democrats with contact, no threat, but with contact even lesser of a threat
Religion as an identity
religion binds us to similar minded people, and similar social identity
religion is personal where as nationalism is political
beliefs are shaped by our environment and we eventually chose our religious identity
Politics of Religion
how policies shape role of religion
how peoples political and social lives influence their policy preference
Religion into politics: 2 Dimensions
preferences on economic policy,
preferences over social liberties policy
How can religion influence someone?
religion does influence voters preference because religion offers security and creates community, so if one is going through hardships we dont need the government because we know that the church is there.
Religion as an Opiate of the Masses
Marx describes this as the lulls of people into submission
you just sit there and pray, and not actually do anything about the things you want.
Landon Schnable: Used survey data to see whether religion really is a “compensatory resource” for the oppressed in the U.S
poor people need to chose which side they want to take.
they chose socially liberal but the government takes advantage economically because of the trade off.
what do poor people get from religion?
1) structurally disadvantaged groups” get more psychological benefits from religion
2) psychological benefits make them more religous
3) religion males groups less liberal than what they should be
when asked about things that they should be in favor of, they are still conservative.
What did Schnable find about in terms of women being a part of the structurally disadvantaged?
she finds that because women have a more difficult time to live, so we turn to go and that influences political views even if policies are in our best interest.
Ana Del O & Jonathan Rodden: Who supports left (liberal) wing parties across the WEIRD world look at income and religion
income does not actually impact choice, religion does have more impact, for the poor, religion takes them away from liberal policies
more religious people are more distracted and vote for social dimension and not their economic dimension
Politics in Religion
do religious elites have make religion political?
1) programming
- letter writing, invite elected officials
2) informal discussions
3) sermons or other formal speec
How do we asses these different ways of seeing how religion influences politics?
survery of elites, how do you talk about politics
2) ask people how often does the leader talk about politics
BCH: How do we learn about politics in churches? dont rely on pastor or churches but speeches themselves
looked at 135k sermons
what are concerns that come with BCH’s method of looking at 135,000 sermons?
whos uploading these sermons? are they a representative sample? only getting at one way of religious communication
3) lots of reading
How do BCH carry out their experiment
computational social sciences:
have assistance from computers but have to tell them exactly what to look for
which sermons are political?
tags added my uphplders 2) human coders
Results from BCH
Us based pastors and sermons
1) over 1/3 of sermons discuss politics
2) over 2/3 of pastors mention politics
3) no difference between male and female evangelics
and non evan.
4) churches in more libersl areas are more likley to talk about politics
Economics: How can we measure it?
per capita, income inequality, organization of ecnomic interests
policies, are some more supportive less supportive of economic interests
PER capita income across weird world
national income GDP: market value of everything produced in a country normalized in two ways
PPP: purchasing power parity
Calculating GDO per capita bc of different populations
Income inequality in the WEIRD world?
WERID countries use income inequality
Brian Nolan, Richardi, Valenzuela: Review why income inequality is rising in the weird world.
Globalization
technology
financialization
labor market institutions
redistribution
NRV’S Theory of decline in unionization rates
less demand for unionization from workers
employers oppose uionizing
changes in economy
Schmitt and Mitukiewiez; Effects of politics in unionization
4 types of political systems that leads to unioization
1) social democratic:statte intevervenes suopport employement
2) continental markek/ christian democractic market : state intervenes on social issues but less on economic matters
3) liberal market : minimial state intervention
4) ex dictatorship
Paul Frymer and Jacob Grumback: Give us reasons why we should care about unions
unions impact political preferences
influence racial resentment among white americans
Does union membership influence politics
recrtuitment leaders minimive division to minimize union size
link with democrtic party: both party and unions seek to build interacial coaltion
contact theory
Do unions predict politics
yes.
while respondents who belong to union s have less racial sentmennt but not liberal, less resentmnt
joining a union reduces racial resetnmemt towards AA
WEIRD Political systems and economics
3 approaches
1) social democracies create a stop so inequality doesnt continue
state helps prevent individuals
2) corporaists states / christian democratic: market remains capitalistic
3) liberal markets: if struggline dont turn to marlet pay for what you can afford
but will only help in dire needs, when extremely necessary.
Broila and Collins: different cultural approaches institutionalization and reinforcement of cultural preferences:
show us how men vs women and how culture dominated during covid
demmark : men and women are supported equally
germany : inequalities continue
USA: liberal market- inequalities depen
Broila and Collins model culture and politics mutually reinforcing
culture kicks in, initital response
2) response reinforces existing political beliefs
Tarik Abou Chadi and Ellen Emmergut
Electoral coalitions determing welfare outcomes:
high skilled middle class vulmerable to market shocks supportive forms of welfare
2) low skilled working class increasingly concerned about globalization immigration
how voter coalitions predict welfare priorities
different voters, different welfare
policIes
) low swilled voters working class traditonal welfare , globalization, immigration
2) high skilled workers middle class : Growing preferences for new forms of welfare to protec-“market shocks”
how do parties use welfare to gain support
left wing sometimes do both but soemtimes abondem working class values
right wing parties may use traditional welfare immigration restrictions to appeal to the working class
Aboud Chadi and Immergut results
move away from original plan when competition goes up
if there is enough competitino left wing parties will abnden their core va;ies and right wing will take over by offering traditional welfare right wing government increase traditinoal welfare s
Other policies may also reflect culture and interests
economic representation
is government attunded to certain types of economic interests than others??
The US has lots of limitations on and protectino on who can donate to yet we still see that rich preferences are still overrepresnted.
Tax cuts for the wealthy
different countries vary in how tax cuts are done
Hope and Limburg: why doe some countries have tax cuts and others dont
1) different types of countries are more likey to engage in tax cuts so they look at what those different predictors are by matching:
similar tacts cuts with and without , isolate effects of tax cuts
2) for timing of tax cuts they “line up” when the tax cuts were done
3) asses impact of different DV (outcomes) inequaloty GDP and unemployment
1) inequality:after tax cuts income inequality went up
tax cuts dont help to make society equal
economic growth: there is no significant impact on increase in growth but even if there is not any decline it not growing regardless.
Ballard-Rosa Marik Richard ; is it ecnomomic or culture that drives populism??
2 words:
endogeneity, antonym of exogeneity
B-RMRS want to know the impact of culture and economics on populism, they think that culture is influences by economics so then culture becomes enodgenous culture is endogenous to economics
economics is a potential cofounder
How does B-RMRS make a distinction in this relationship
particicular culture such as authoritarian culture values is impacted by economics
3 values:
1) aggression
2) submission
3) conventionalism
BRMRSRelationship on economics and culture
surveyed people
exogenous measure of the economy, something that is not related, some other factors from outside that is not related to what we are trying to study
they make a shock
what is the result of the shock
- they use economic markets in China
a chinese market picks up a tshirt bussiness and sells them for a lower price than the bussiness already established there
B-RMRS levarage shock of chineese imports
different good impact different markets
different labor markets find it more or less important in different areas.
BRMRS results
economic shocks are related to authoritarianism, specficially aggression
people are pissed off that their money is being taken
family/ people that work at the tshirt company become for aggressive aka authoritarian
some places do not have to worry about the price of the tshirts.some do, amd others really do have to because it is impacting their bussiness
Yotman Margalit: Review evidence of rise of Population: Is populisim really about ecnomics ??
if economic cant explain populism what can? guess back to vulture, in 2 different ways it connects back to BMRS
xenophobia not authoritarianism
xenophobia influences economics, not xenophobia itself but how economy is percieved.
