Download What do the ideas and believes influence our minds?

POLITICAL CULTURE
Fundamental Values, Sentiments, & Knowledge
Role of Ideas in Politics
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Action from thinking and believe
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How do the ideas and believes appear in our minds?
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Critical examination of reality (thinking for oneself)
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Influence of others’ opinions (family, education, media)
What do the ideas and believes influence our minds?
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Some forms of teaching imprison the mind
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Others liberate the mind enabling it to think critically
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Mind control – a much more effective method?
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Two main concepts about the role of ideas in politics
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Political ideology
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Political culture
Ideology vs. Political Culture
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Both are belief systems made up of cognitions,
values, emotions
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Unlike ideology, culture is transmitted by system’s
socialization process
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Ideologies reflect intellectual efforts, often identified
with individuals; political culture relates to the actual
values, attitudes of beliefs that most people hold in
various societies
Concept of Culture
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Frames the context in which politics occurs (culture
defines interests and how they are to be pursued)
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Links individual and collective identities
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Defines group boundaries and organizes actions within
and between them
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Provides a framework for interpreting the actions and
motives
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Provides resources that leaders and groups use as
instruments of political organization and mobilization
Political Culture
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Political Culture is constituted by the cognitions, values,
and emotional commitments that the population of a
collectivity brings to the process whereby scarce values
are allocated.
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Elements of Political Culture

Cognitions = empirical beliefs (how things are). Example: "A
market economy is more productive than a planned
economy.“
 Values = normative beliefs (how things ought to be).
Example: Individual liberty should be the most important
thing.“
 Emotional commitments = positive and negative feelings
(affect)
American Political Culture
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Liberty
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Democracy
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Political equality
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Individualism
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Justice and the rule of law
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Capitalism and free enterprise
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Nationalism, optimism, and idealism (e.g., “The
American Dream”)
Public Opinion
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Collection of shared attitudes of many different people
relating to politics, public issues, or making of public
policy
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Shaped by political culture & political socialization
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Can be analyzed according to distribution (physical
shape of responses), intensity (how strongly), and
stability (how much changes over time)
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Consensus occurs when general agreement on issue
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Opinion that is strongly divided between 2 very different
views is divisive opinion.
Political Culture vs. Public Opinion
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Political Culture is broader than public opinion and
functions as a frame which constrains acceptable
political action and discourse.
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Political Culture is relates to deep-seated values and it is
more enduring, stable and cross-generational.
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Both measure people’s feelings
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Public opinion reflects short-term outlooks (increase
defense spending or cut taxes) change far more quickly.
Measuring Public Opinion
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Most reliable measure is public opinion poll
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Random Sample
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
Everyone has equal chance of being included
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Only need 1200-1500 regardless of size of population
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Self-selected/straw polls NOT accurate
Carefully Worded Questions

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Actually Seeks the Truth

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No bias and clearly differentiates alternatives
Advocacy and ‘Push Polls’
Polls just a snapshot and may be wrong!!!
Factors Influencing Public Opinion
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Race and ethnic differences
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Religious differences
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Gender
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Social and economic differences
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Regional differences (urban/suburban/rural)
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Issue framing
Parochial Culture
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In this model citizens have no cognitive orientations
toward the political system.
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Societies characterized by this type of political culture do
not expect anything positive of government, nor do they
expect to participate in politics because it is seen as the
elite domain.
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Furthermore, the government is seen as the enforcer of
its own rules and consequently, the realm of politics is
seen as one to be avoided whenever possible.
Subject Culture
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In this model citizens have cognitive orientations
toward only the output aspects of the system.
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This tends to be manifested in a citizenry that expects
positive action from government, but that does not
tend to be politically active themselves.
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They, too, see politics as an elite domain only to be
engaged in by those with power and influence.
Participatory Culture
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In this model citizens have cognitive orientations toward
both the input and output aspects of the system.
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Societies which possess this type of political culture tend
to have citizens with high expectations of government
and of personally participating in politics, if at no other
time than voting in an election.
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This type of culture is central to the principles of any
democratic society.
“A Renaissance of Political Culture?”
Jackman & Miller, 1996
Critique of Conventional Theories
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A challenge to Weber's Protestant Ethic and earlier
theories that looked at the 'right' cultural attitudes and
beliefs as necessary conditions for economic progress.
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The general explanatory value of political culture (e.g.,
mass political behavior) is limited.
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The political culture approach needs to be re-evaluated
in institutional terms that more directly acknowledge the
role of political considerations in explaining performance.
“A Renaissance of Political Culture?”
Jackman & Miller, 1996
Arguments:
► Institutional performance does not depends in any
appreciable manner on cultural traditions.
► Our results indicate that the cultural accounts of political
life are substantially overstated.
► No systematic linkage between the measures of culture
and subsequent economic growth in industrial
democracies.
► No causal inferences implied by the cultural account from
the observed correlations between "culture" and
"democracy.“
► Institutions (political, social, and economic) structure the
distribution of incentives for individual action.