Test 2 Flashcards
problems with models of political development?
Sociological model:
oOverly deterministic oWhat is the mechanism by which groups vote? oUnderplays the role of parties themselves oDifficulty in explaining de/re- alignment
Michigan model: o Most western democracies have undergone “de- alignment” o Increase in proportional representation systems problematic o Difficult to generalize outside of the US (two-party democracy)
Symbolic politics:
o What is a symbol? What is
rational? Assumption of
exclusivity
o Alternate explanations (e.g.
RGCT)
o Foolish (IMHQ) to assume
such a special process for
politics
Rational choice:
o “Impoverished” view of
humanity in general
o Works in economics but not
in other transactions.
"Why do people vote at all?”
o Limited evidence
o Alternative explanations
(e.g. vote symbolic of class
conflict)
o Party ID- costs of bad vote
greater than wrong choice
of power.
Converse argues to replace ___ with ___
ideology with belief systems
Converse’s definition of a belief system?
We define a belief system as a configuration of ideas and attitudes in which the elements are bound together by some form of constraint or functional interdependence.”
Lipset defines left and right wing politics as…
By left we shall mean advocating social change in the direction of greater equality – political economic or social; by right we shall mean supporting a traditional more or less hierarchical social order, and opposing change toward equality.”
Politics in the lay audience
(A) Converse argues in this
famous paper that the
general public do not have
a constrained, functionally
independent political belief
system.
a.His evidence was that when
most people were asked to
rate if they saw themselves
as more politically
conservative or liberal most
people did not have any
answer.
(B) Conversely, people argue
they must hold some
meaning because they
continue to be present in
our everyday lives (i.e.
journal articles, campaigns,
comics or advertisements).Lay Audience research highlights
In a NZ sample, participants were asked “to what extent do you identify yourself as being politically to the left or to the right?”
- The 40% of people who did respond, when latter asked if they knew the meaning for leftwing and rightwing political labels-majority said, “I don’t know”.
- Yet, participants still managed to pick a position that reflected the political party they voted for.
- How? Based on the public’s (lay audience) stereotypical understandings of LW and RW politics.
***Evidence that the same political labels hold different meanings for different constituencies (group of voters from the same legislative body i.e. Labour and national).
Research Example: Item vs Inventory Measures
The Right-Wing Authoritarianism Scale (RWA)
o Measures individual’s ideological commitment towards tradition, authority, social conventions, against threats of change, protests and political rebellion. o Predicts a high degree of submission towards authorities and aggression towards individuals who have been sanctioned by an authority figure. o High degree of adherence to societal conventions that are endorsed within society.
Indicate that issues relevant to these items differ from country to country.
Are liberal-conservative and LW-RW labels correlated and interchangeable?
what is the political paradox?
In NZ liberal-conservative and LW-RW labels are highly correlated and used by the public interchangeably (r = .60).
However, ACT party voters showed a preference for being labeled liberal and RW.
This supports that these terms are measuring two different dimensions of political ideology!
e.g.
(A) Social Issues
(B) Economic Issues
Thus, ACT party votes identify as socially liberal and economically conservative!
In addition, breaking down correlation between labels by political party…
Green and Labour who are traditionally liberal on both dimensions use the terms interchangeably.
National (RW), ACT (Liberal-RW) and UFNZ had insignificant correlation between the two political labels.
Why do NZ political parties not have to conform to both LW-Liberal and conservative-RW labels?
(A) the dimensionality of
political belief systems
(social and economic).
(B) NZ's unique proportional
representative electoral
system.Motivated Social-Cognition model of political conservatism
A matching process takes place whereby people adopt ideological belief systems (such as conservatism, RWA, and SDO) that are most likely to satisfy their psychological
needs and motives (such as needs for order, structure, and closure and the avoidance of
uncertainty or threat).
Correlates of conservatism in NZ:
oNational as the political party preference oEndorsement of use of animals in research oSupport for genetic engineering oIncreasing red meat consumption (and less fruit and cereal) oSexism oMaterialism oRacism oStrong preference for hierarchy-enhancing occupations (military, legal, institutional) vs hierarchy- attentuating roles (e.g., social work, public defense, low- status jobs).
John Ducketts Dual Process Model of Prejudice:
Two pathways to prejudice
Pathway 1: RWA Children who grow up with punitive/strict parents develop a conformity personality. This personality style leads to people to perceive the world as dangerous. To cope with this fear people adopt a authoritarianism attitude: submission to authority, for people to do as their told, resistant to change, preference for tradition. This leads to authoritarian’s being aggressive towards members of society that have been sanctioned by authority figures. =prejudice
Pathway 2: SDO Children grow up with unaffectionate but not overly punitive parents. This leads to a tough-minded and ruthless personality forming. This leads to people perceiving the world as a dog- eats-dog world in which they need to dominate other social groups to stay the alpha male. Leads to a preference for the ingroups-social elites- dominant group. =prejudice.
How does John Ducketts Dual Process Model of Prejudice link to political conservatism?
*High scores in both RWA and SDO are associated with political conservativism. SDO=preference for social hierarchy RWA=preservation of the status quo
Correlation between seeing the world as a dangerous place and viewing it as being more competitive (.22) Correlation between social dominance and right-wing authoritarianism (.38) Viewing the world as a competitive jungle was a strong predictor of SDO (.62) SDO and RWA explain over half of the variance in predicting political conservatism.
Linking to political conservatism: Multiple conservatisms:
oRWA measures aspects of
social conservatism.
oSDO measures aspects of
economic conservatism.
what is affective forecasting
Predicting what makes us happy
e.g. people who buy lottery
tickets because they think
it will make them happy if
they winHappiness can be broken down into two key components:
(A) Happiness (affective
component)
(B) Life Satisfaction
