Social Attitudes Flashcards
What are the mechanisms for postmaterialism?
- Generational/cohort effect - each new generation develops views in their formative years, and retains similar attitudes throughout their life
- Life cycle (ageing) effect - people become more conservative in their views as they become older
- Period effect - all cohorts are changing their views in the same direction over time, due to changes in the societal climate
Definition of postmaterialism
Postmaterialists care about quality of life, the environment, democracy, and human rights, mainly for the post-war generation who were socialised in the 1960s
Materialists care mainly about economic growth and security
Inglehart himself says - “Unfortunately, the word “postmodern” has become loaded with so many meanings that it is in danger of conveying everything and nothing.”
Brooks and Manza
- No evidence that people can be classified as either post-materialist or materialist and are categorically distinct - rather, they have mixed values. It is possibile to affirm both materialist and postmaterialist values, and they can be structurally compatible.
- For example, ‘postmaterial’ environmental concerns can be material based on risks for jobs and economic growth that the establishment of struct environmental regulations threaten.
- Post-materialism-materialism is an issue dimension and its relative salience compared with economic left-right is a separate question. Caring less about (salience of) one issue does not mean you take a particular position on another issue
- Supposedly post-materialist New Social Movements are often concerned with the achievement of “materialist” goals, and the post-materialists are not less likely to see the state as a relevant means to achieving their aims
- Argues against dealignment, proposes realignment, where voters switch from one party to another. In US and Australia, party ideology defines many aspects of voters’ lives; in Britain and Canada, voters have a tendency to switch parties on a whim, perhaps only for one election, as there is far less loyalty towards a particular party
Inglehart
Proposes the postmaterialism thesis:
1. The comparative affluence experienced by post-war generations led to the decreasing relevance of material security, and instead a higher importance to be placed on non-material goals such as self-expression, autonomy, freedom of speech, gender equality and environmentalism. The needs for “belonging, esteem, and intellectual and aesthetic satisfaction became more prominent”.
2. Increasing prosperity would increase such postmaterialist values through intergenerational replacement.
3. The shift from materialist to post-materialist values is ‘only one aspect of a broader cultural shift from survival values to self-expression values’.
4. Important: post-materialist values are not “anti” materialist, they come around only because of the attainment of materialist goals. It’s not a reversal of values, more a repositioning of priorities
Silent Revolution thesis
Rapid technological and economic development after WW2 led to the fulfilment of basic needs, such as food and shelter, as well as the rise of the welfare state, which in turn led to ‘emergence of concern with new nonmaterial needs, such as esteem and self-actualisation’
Scarcity hypothesis
An individual’s priorities reflect the socio-economic environment: one places the greatest subjective value on those things that are in relatively short supply’. Hence due to diminishing marginal utility, the younger generations gain more utility by satisfying higher needs, which is also supported by Maslow’s hierarchy of needs
Socialisation hypothesis
Generations maintain the values developed during their adolescent years, so the effects of better economic conditions are delayed, and only gradually have impact through generational replacement
Evidence for postmaterialism
- Rise of New Social Movements, e.g. Peace movement, environmentalists, anti-trade.
- Growth of ‘post-materialist’ parties, e.g. Green Party, Radical-right?
- With the diminution of the working class, adaptation of left-wing parties to represent postmaterialists (new-left)
Swales and Taylor
The growth in social liberalism seen in recent decades continues. Attitudes to sex before marriage, same-sex relationships, abortion and pornography have all become more liberal, while attitudes to euthanasia remain largely unchanged. Those without formal educational qualifications are more likely to be socially conservative
Perrett
The public, on average, moved to the left during the early 1990s, to the right during New Labour, and back to the left from 2010. Such oscillations are even more pronounced for positions along a welfare dimension. In contrast, average positions along a libertarian-authoritarian dimension were constant until around 2010, when the public became more liberal
Evidence against postmaterialism or increased liberalism
Stability and no cohort effects on attitudes to abortion in Britain since mid-1990s; and stable liberal attitudes to euthanasia in Britain
Caughey et al
- There is a negative relationship between economic conservatism and social and immigration conservatism, which means that European mass ideology cannot be captured with a single left-right dimension.
- Compared to Southern and Eastern Europeans, Northern Europeans tend to be more progressive on social and immigration issues but more conservative on economics.
Lipset
Expansion of higher education and pervasive contribution of mass media means increased opportunity and knowledge to engage with politics, which leads to new value-based cleavages that crosscut left-right conflicts over distribution of material resources
‘increases in tolerance associated with higher educational levels are greater than those related to higher occupational level
Devin et al
Since the 1980s, the European public has moved ‘markedly leftward on social issues and modestly so on immigration’
Betz
- Green supporters are heavily concerned with work and employment, but in terms of ‘good’ or ‘meaningful’ work rather than menial work: thus although ‘green supporters seem to vote for the Greens for economic reasons, their economic reasons have to be interpreted in a non-materialist way.
- Analyses the German Green Party and how they succeeded in breaking the 5% barrier in 1984 for the first time in more than thirty years, as the first large post-materialist party in Europe. Education was the most important factor, and because in Germany there was an increase in unemployment among these highly-educated students, there was a rise in Green party support amongst the least well-off
- Green party voters (in Germany), although highly educated, are not economically secure, but despite this they support the Greens for post-materialist reasons
HENCE even seemingly material reasons may be explained in a postmaterial way - there could be a significant measurement issue - it is difficult to take the rise of so-called post-materialist parties as evidence for the rise of post-materialist values, because there may be other material reasons that people vote for them – thus the significant overlapping of social cleavages may confuse the picture
Dalton
- Issue voting eg. environment and the emergence of women’s movement have increased the boundaries of politics
- Exception in declining social cleavages is race and ethnicity (e.g. black voters and Democratic Party)
- Mechanisms for issue voting and dealignment:
a) Ties between individuals and respective social groups have declined
b) fewer people fit into well-defined categories
c) parties sub-dividing to include many aspects and reinforced the process;
d) Citizens are less likely to rely on these social group cues even when perceiving them, as they feel better able to make decisions;
e) cognitive mobilisation, where voters are better equipped to evaluate policies for themselves, partly due to greater information availability (media) and educational attainment - Environmentalism actually experienced a decline in Britain, and that education is a main predictor of climate beliefs
- Argues for a ‘New Politics’ and dealignment, where individuals are less attached to their political party.
BUT in Europe, the most educated and informed are most likely to have strong identification (rebuts education theory) - Effects of dealignment: more likely to abstain or be volatile in their vote choice, express their opinions outside the electoral arena, be critical of political parties or democratic institutions
- The new-politics value cleavage is unlikely to lead to a party-system realignment because it represents issue voting and will not likely be institutionalized in new parties: “Because issue-group cleavages are more difficult to institutionalize or “freeze” via social-group identifications linked to mass organizations, they may not be as stable
Oesch and Rennwald
- The Radical Right is on the rise, as a third pole besides the Left and the CentreRight. These three poles compete for the allegiance of different social classes.
- Socio-cultural professionals vote for the Left, large employers and managers vote for the Centre-Right. The Radical Right competes with the Centre-right for the votes of small business owners, and the Left for the votes of the working class.
- The traditional Left-Right axis is economic, but the new tripolar space is structured by the cultural axis of conflict.
Tilley
- The British electorate has become substantially more libertarian over the last 30 years, but older people have remained more authoritarian than younger people.
- No evidence that social ageing (life cycle) leads to increases in authoritarianism, and that this is a generational change. (i.e. old people are still authoritarian)
- Measurement issues - measuring post-materialism may primarily be measuring liberalism/authoritarianism, and we see similar cohort replacement effects for these values
- Rebuts education/class thesis - controlling for education and class do little to moderate large cohort effects in liberalism in Britain. Notes endogeneity - liberal people choose to go into education, where they are socialised into certain views
Flanagan
Critiques Inglehart - argues that traditional / liberal values are more accurate, and not the postmaterialist/ materialist dimension
There is a confusion with liberal and authoritarian values - post-materialist issues are actually non-materialist liberal issues
Kirby
Attention-raising protests helped increase climate concern
Guber
People’s attitudes towards the environment (especially global warming) are divided across partisan lines, but this only happens when people acquire information and become familiar with elite cues
de Graaf and Evans
- Rising education and the severity of the war-time experience is the main reason for the change in values, not formative affluence.
- Post-materialism is very sensitive to current economic conditions and not solely due to cohort replacement.
Supported by Altemeyer - liberal values are positively related to psychological security, so war experience as a threat to such security can affect liberal values, not postmaterialism
Weill
Postmaterial values measures liberal values, and the increase in recent decades seems to be rooted in education, not affluence
Kalmijn and Kraaykamp
Higher educated are more liberal because:
a) institutions of higher education transmit values to students directly and such values are often egalitarian or liberal,
b) having followed schooling at a higher level increases a person’s breadth of perspective which can reduce intolerance and lead to support for ‘new’ values,
c) selection effects since educational system selects on the basis of cognitive abilities - indirectly affect attitudes, higher cognitive = better able to deal with complex issues and can have a more balanced view on matters,
d) higher educated tend to answer questions in surveys in a socially desirable manner, leading to an above average support for tolerance and liberalism on social issues among the higher educated (Jackman and Muha)
