Abstract:
We asked Americans to tell us the national and world events that they believe to have been especially important sive the 1930s, using replicated cross-section surveys carried out in 1985, in 2000 and after september 11, 2001. Our primary interests are, first, in how collective memoies change as new events occur, such as the eold of the COld war or the 9/11 terrorist attacks; and second, in whether the origin of such memries during the critical period of adolescence ad early adulthood, as well as their connetion with education, remain stable over time and constisent with theory. As part of our investigation we consider four related issues: collective forgetting as as well collective remembering; the distinction between ease of recalling events and judgments of their importance; compound events, wic are composed of sub-events tat can be remembered separately by respnodents; and larger social and technologcal changes difficult or impossible to date with any precision. Panel data frm the second and third surveys, obtain sdhortly after 911, air in determining which earlier collective memories were superseded by memories of the terrorist attack itself.
memories of earlier events come into competition with more recent events; which are most pronounced when forces to recall them? TO what extent is this recall connected to two social background variables: education and cohort experience?
Our youth is a "critical period." experiences during our adolescence have an especially strong impact on memory. Learning about events second hand (i.e. learning about the depression in history class) is not nearly the same as learning about the depression by living through it (218). yet, events experienced when one is old, and hardened in their ways and opinions, are also less likely to have a substantial impact. thus we see experience, as well as age, determine an event's impact on an individuald values/attitudes. "moreover, an onging event stimulates conversations with others that also enhance memory" (219).
Changes in the Events Americans Remember as Important (223):
from 1985-2000
from 2000-2001
Showing posts with label week 8. Show all posts
Showing posts with label week 8. Show all posts
Monday, May 26, 2008
Mishler and Rose (2007) Generation, Age, and TIme: The Dynamics of Political Learning durning Russia's Transformation
Abstract:
hen the Soviet Union colapsed, most Russians had lived teir entire lives in a quientessiantlly authoritaritna culture. Hanving neen socialized in this envormnment, how could citizens acquire the attitudes and behaviors necessary to suppor a new, most pluralistic regime? Cultural theries of political learning emphasize the primacy of childhood socilaization and hold that altering initual attitudes is a decades-long process that depends on generational replacement. Institutional theories emphasize adult relearning in response to changing circumstances regardless of socialization. Lifetime learning integratres the competing persoectives. Mutilevel modesls sing New Russia Rarometer data from 1992 to 2005 confirm the persistence of some generational differences in Russian political attitudes but demonstrate even larger effects resulting from adult relearning. Lifetime learning provides the most comprehensive account ad suggest that Russian wold quickly acquire the attitudes and behaviors appropriate to democracy--if Russian elites supply more authentic democratic institutions.
the strength of the shock! matters. this is how you "get" adults.
Political learning and relearning
cultural theories emphasize early learning; youth are indoctrinated; and are also taught indirectly, and unconsciously. thus political attitudes are deeply ingrained and unlikely to change, especially as time goes on.
at the forefront of this theory is the "primacy principle:" early life scialization trumps later life socialization (searing, wright and rabonowitz 1976).
yet differences in gender, ethnicity and family position can produce important variations in socialization.
institutional theories emphasize adult political experiences based on contemporary institutions and circumstances. this theory holds that attitudes are malleable and adaptable. thus later life experiences play an equal, nay, a greater role in determining political attitudes and opinions. here it is the "structure principle:" attitudes learned early in life interpret and shape later life learning in a classic path-dependent process reinforcing early life socialization.
life time leaning theory emphasizes the importance of both culture and institutions. according to this perspective, the political lessons of childhood are variously reinforced, revised, or replaced over time by later life experiences. thus this theory tests the durability of early learning in the face of later life experiences on political attitudes and behaviors.
Generations:
(1) survival
(2) normal
(4) transitional
Dependent Variables:
(1) Attitudes toward old regime (authoritarian)
(2) Attitudes toward new regime (democratic)
There are at least two reasons why generations are important--
(1) historical--
All generational in society may be socialized broadly into a common political culture, but different aspects of that culture may be emphasized depending upon the particular histirocal environment (war, depresssion etc.) within which differnt cohorts were socialized.
(2) social and economic conditions-
Class notes:
This does not look mannheimian. Altough the socialization account may be Mannheimian, it is more incremental/gradual change.
hen the Soviet Union colapsed, most Russians had lived teir entire lives in a quientessiantlly authoritaritna culture. Hanving neen socialized in this envormnment, how could citizens acquire the attitudes and behaviors necessary to suppor a new, most pluralistic regime? Cultural theries of political learning emphasize the primacy of childhood socilaization and hold that altering initual attitudes is a decades-long process that depends on generational replacement. Institutional theories emphasize adult relearning in response to changing circumstances regardless of socialization. Lifetime learning integratres the competing persoectives. Mutilevel modesls sing New Russia Rarometer data from 1992 to 2005 confirm the persistence of some generational differences in Russian political attitudes but demonstrate even larger effects resulting from adult relearning. Lifetime learning provides the most comprehensive account ad suggest that Russian wold quickly acquire the attitudes and behaviors appropriate to democracy--if Russian elites supply more authentic democratic institutions.
the strength of the shock! matters. this is how you "get" adults.
Political learning and relearning
cultural theories emphasize early learning; youth are indoctrinated; and are also taught indirectly, and unconsciously. thus political attitudes are deeply ingrained and unlikely to change, especially as time goes on.
at the forefront of this theory is the "primacy principle:" early life scialization trumps later life socialization (searing, wright and rabonowitz 1976).
yet differences in gender, ethnicity and family position can produce important variations in socialization.
institutional theories emphasize adult political experiences based on contemporary institutions and circumstances. this theory holds that attitudes are malleable and adaptable. thus later life experiences play an equal, nay, a greater role in determining political attitudes and opinions. here it is the "structure principle:" attitudes learned early in life interpret and shape later life learning in a classic path-dependent process reinforcing early life socialization.
life time leaning theory emphasizes the importance of both culture and institutions. according to this perspective, the political lessons of childhood are variously reinforced, revised, or replaced over time by later life experiences. thus this theory tests the durability of early learning in the face of later life experiences on political attitudes and behaviors.
Generations:
(1) survival
(2) normal
(4) transitional
Dependent Variables:
(1) Attitudes toward old regime (authoritarian)
(2) Attitudes toward new regime (democratic)
There are at least two reasons why generations are important--
(1) historical--
All generational in society may be socialized broadly into a common political culture, but different aspects of that culture may be emphasized depending upon the particular histirocal environment (war, depresssion etc.) within which differnt cohorts were socialized.
(2) social and economic conditions-
Class notes:
This does not look mannheimian. Altough the socialization account may be Mannheimian, it is more incremental/gradual change.
Jennings and Stoker (2008) f time and the development of partisan polarization in the United States
Jennings, M. Kent and Laura Stoker. Of time and the development of partisan polarization in the United States. American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Overview:
Jennings and Stoker provide a new understanding of mass partisan polarization at the aggregate level and of political socialization dynamics at the individual level, wrought by tying these two topics together. individual-level and aggregate-level mass partisan polarization at the aggregate level and of political socialization dynamics at the individual level offer new insights into how partisan polarization varies across time, generations and issues. They propose individuals are less open to change beyond young adulthood. They rely on results from Jennings' long-term panel study, after which they use simulations to generate expectations about how these developments play out across cohorts, issues and time. These expectations are evaluated through a cohort analysis of NES data (1972-2004).
Introduction:
Converse (1969) created a model that helped account for the emergence of partisan stability in varying national contexts over time.
Model:
(1) Generational replacement: Racial reorganization of partisan identification was a slow-moving phenomenon largely fed by population replacement
(2) Individual-level change: Voters have become much better sorted into political parties as elites have become ideologically more distinct
(3) Parties acquire more distinctive issue-based positions: stable partisans gradually coming to embrace the issue stances that their preferred party advocates.
Goal: Provide new understanding of mass partisan polarization at aggregate level and of political socialization dynamics at individual level by tying these two topics together.
· Socialization: join ideas about age-related attitudinal crystallization with age-related, cohort-specific gains in party-issue constraint.
· Partisan polarization in the electorate: examine interaction between individual-level and generational replacement dynamics.
· Consider micro- and the macro-level mechanisms fueling issue-based differences between Democrats and Republicans in the electorate
Micro-Macro Links Model (3 working parts)
(1) Converse's learning resistance phenomenon: Openness to political learning and attitude change declines with age in a non-linear fashion
· 2 conceptions of life-span stability: (a) impressionable years version and (b) mid-life stability
o Fluctuations during late adolescent and young adult years à stage of crystallization à incremental gains well into middle age via experience à increased stability by middle age
(2) Stable political parties leads to constraint between partisan affiliation and issue positions, which will climb with age, non-linearly
Continuing experience with the political system increases partisan attachment
(3) Marked alterations and increases in the nature of partisan cleavages will gradually manifest themselves in the mass electorate
Methodology:
They rely on results from Jennings' 4-wave panel study, after which they use simulations to generate expectations about how these developments play out across cohorts, issues and time. These expectations are evaluated through a cohort analysis of NES data (1972-2004). They do this because although the 4-wave socialization panel data can test propositions about the strengthening of political attitudes and the relationship between these attitudes and partisanship as individuals age, they can't capture the emergence and evolution of partisanship/issue ties across multiple cohorts coming of age under different configurations of issue-based party cleavages.
The Stability of Political Affiliations and Attitudes
Less attitudinal continuity evident as the youth aged from 18 to 26. Continuity more pronounced over the next decade. Gains remained in place as youth aged from 35-50 à "plateauing" effect
Make-shift life span ordering: Then they combine ("splice") the youth and parent panels. In 8 of the 11 measures, there are early gains then gradual increases or little or no change over the remaining years.
3 exceptions:
(1) Parental PID stability substantially exceeds that found in the younger generation
(2) Much lower parental stability with respect to the newer issues represented by evaluation of the women's movement and the legalization of marijuana
The Linkage of Issue Positions and Party Identification
*The findings are in Table 2. They find a dramatic rise with respect to ideological identification over time. Plausible hypotheses include: (1) political learning processes associated with aging and (2) period effects associated with more distinctive partisan divisions. They will test these next.
Simulating Developmental and Period Effects in Party-Issue Constraint
(1) The first scenario assumes the party's positions were constant between 1930-2000, and they find the extent of the party cleavage in the electorate, indexed by the average constraint coefficient is constant over time.
(2) The second scenario assumes the party's positions diverged after 1970, and they find (a) the older cohorts are less responsive, less open to change than are the younger cohorts and (b) cohort differences grow over time. Whereas initial cohort differences are inconsequential, they are dramatic at the end of the period and display a pronounced curvilinear pattern. The highest level of constraint occurs in the 1970 cohort, which was just coming of age when the new party difference emerged.
(3) It is the interaction of life cycle, developmental process and a new political environment that?eventually?produces a distinctive "70s generation."
In this simulation the party difference emerges in 1970 and is stable subsequently. Nevertheless, the population continues to polarize on the issues for three reasons.
First, the operation of developmental processes, as people slowly adjust to the new political reality by modifying their issue attitudes and/or partisan affiliations.
Second, it reflects the process of population replacement in that new entrants to the polity evidence more constraint than do those who are exiting.
Third, and most interestingly, the heightened polarization reflects the interaction between generation formation and developmental processes. At first, new entrants look hardly more polarized than those exiting. But the polity is losing people who do not develop and is replacing them with people who do develop as they age. As a result, the population replacement engine produces effects that are increasingly felt as the developmental process plays itself out. Overall, partisan polarization in the 2000 electorate is the consequence of an event taking place thirty years earlier, an event whose full effects will not be felt until well after the pre-1970s cohorts are fully replaced.
(3) In the final simulation, the party difference is modeled as emerging in 1970 and then continuing to expand. The patterns found in this case (Table 5) are similar to those seen in table 4, with four significant differences.
First, constraint grows more rapidly over time within each cohort.
Second, constraint develops even more quickly for new cohorts facing a highly polarized partisan environment than for those facing a moderately polarized partisan environment, producing cohort differences not seen in Table 4.
Third, and as a consequence, enhanced cross-sectional cohort differences appear, especially as time passes.
Finally, the overall partisan polarization level grows at a faster rate than seen in the previous simulation, and by 2000 is larger.
The Rise of Partisan Polarization in the Electorate
*Table 7 contains the results.Results demonstrate that individuals develop greater consistency between their partisan affiliation and their issue commitment as they age, with the greatest gains usually coming in early adulthood. They also suggest that party differences on these longstanding issues have been growing, in contrast to the steady state modeled in simulation one.
Race and gender issues: The pattern changes where party divergence came in the 1960s and early 1970s (second panel of Table 7). As with our second and third simulations, cohort differences are initially minimal, as the 1972-1976 column shows, but eventually become pronounced and assume a curvilinear shape.
Patterning for these issues is similar to that found for the New Deal issues.
First, constraint gains are typically highest in early adulthood.
Second, each succeeding cohort is entering the electorate with a closer alignment between their party affiliation and their views on race and gender issues. As a consequence, by the last surveys the younger cohorts look very much like those who preceded them, save for the oldest cohort.
Results more striking for cultural issues index.
(1) Constraint levels begin at near zero in 1972-1976 for all cohorts. They climb steadily across the period, but especially for the cohort coming of age in the mid-1970s. The older cohorts lag behind; they have too much political experience from another era. The younger cohorts lag behind; they have not yet developed crystallized partisan or other political attitudes.
(2) Initial cohort differences: Each succeeding cohort entering the electorate shows higher constraint levels than the proceeding one. The partisanship of Americans socialized before the 1960s, has been, and remains, primarily tied to their positions on New Deal issues that have long divided the parties. The results for the youngest cohort are especially striking in the prominence of cultural issues, where the coefficient nearly matches that found for the New Deal issues.
The "new" issues involving race, gender, and culture, taken together, are becoming ever more important over time and across generation without supplanting traditional issue concerns.
As new entrants face a political environment where the partisan differences are not only evident on more issues but are also becoming clearer, partisan affiliations become increasingly aligned with a diverse set of issue commitments. Simultaneously, the power of cultural issues in defining Americans' partisanship is beginning to outweigh that of issues concerning race and gender.
In the 1970s and 1980s opinions on cultural issues were mostly disconnected from partisan affiliations, though attitudes about race and gender were seemingly influential. By the late 1980s and especially in the past decade, the pattern has reversed.
For each cohort save one the connection between cultural issues has grown stronger and has come to outstrip the connection based on race and gender issues.
Cultural issues in the electorate can only be expected to exacerbate the partisan cleavage, especially as new impressionable generations enter the electorate replacing those for whom cultural issues have little bearing on their partisan affiliations.
Conclusion:
The study of general age-related political maturations processes, life-cycle events and secular movements is important for what it reveals about individuals and the political system. The American electorate will reflect changes in political parties, but it may take some time before these changes emerge. Those who come of age when new party division emerge will be the strongest among all age groups. If party differences become increasingly accentuated over time, the "constraint" levels of young adults will match or exceed those of their politically experienced elders.
The general public has adopted elite-level partisan cleavages over time, but there isn't a simple explanation for this phenomenon. Over the past 30-40 years, there has been an interaction effect among (1) generational replacement of those less polarized by those more polarized, (2) increased polarization at the individual level over time and (3) by the conjunction of these mechanisms as the population became increasingly composed of cohorts that entered the electorate in the wake of new party divisions.
Put differently, "Beneath the clear over-time growth in ideological differences between Democrats and Republicans in the electorate is a dynamic process that varies across time, across issues, and across generations" (Jennings & Stoker, 2008, 24).
There is a historical explanation for the emergence of partisan polarization in the electorate, and for the prominent variation across cohorts as of 1996-2004.
Implications:
Partisan polarization likely to increase (issues: race, gender and cultural matters). Americans' opinions strongly linked with Party ID. This isn't likely to change.
Research Opportunities:
(1) What cues are the public receiving about party differences? Origin of cues?
(2) Does the simple top-down representation of the elite-mass influence process miss dynamics working the other way?
(3) More complete explanations (e.g. political awareness and engagement) for how people develop over the life cycle (other than aging).
(4) Causal mechanisms: Is party ID shaping issue commitments? This would signal partisan polarization and realignment. Or are issue commitments shaping party ID? How does the strength of pre-adult socialization moderate causal dynamics? How do influence flows vary by age? Across generations?
(5) Generalizability across polities?How well does our model (and dynamics we have developed) apply to the party contexts outside of the US? Will be contingent on character, stability of political parties competing within a nation.
Overview:
Jennings and Stoker provide a new understanding of mass partisan polarization at the aggregate level and of political socialization dynamics at the individual level, wrought by tying these two topics together. individual-level and aggregate-level mass partisan polarization at the aggregate level and of political socialization dynamics at the individual level offer new insights into how partisan polarization varies across time, generations and issues. They propose individuals are less open to change beyond young adulthood. They rely on results from Jennings' long-term panel study, after which they use simulations to generate expectations about how these developments play out across cohorts, issues and time. These expectations are evaluated through a cohort analysis of NES data (1972-2004).
Introduction:
Converse (1969) created a model that helped account for the emergence of partisan stability in varying national contexts over time.
Model:
(1) Generational replacement: Racial reorganization of partisan identification was a slow-moving phenomenon largely fed by population replacement
(2) Individual-level change: Voters have become much better sorted into political parties as elites have become ideologically more distinct
(3) Parties acquire more distinctive issue-based positions: stable partisans gradually coming to embrace the issue stances that their preferred party advocates.
Goal: Provide new understanding of mass partisan polarization at aggregate level and of political socialization dynamics at individual level by tying these two topics together.
· Socialization: join ideas about age-related attitudinal crystallization with age-related, cohort-specific gains in party-issue constraint.
· Partisan polarization in the electorate: examine interaction between individual-level and generational replacement dynamics.
· Consider micro- and the macro-level mechanisms fueling issue-based differences between Democrats and Republicans in the electorate
Micro-Macro Links Model (3 working parts)
(1) Converse's learning resistance phenomenon: Openness to political learning and attitude change declines with age in a non-linear fashion
· 2 conceptions of life-span stability: (a) impressionable years version and (b) mid-life stability
o Fluctuations during late adolescent and young adult years à stage of crystallization à incremental gains well into middle age via experience à increased stability by middle age
(2) Stable political parties leads to constraint between partisan affiliation and issue positions, which will climb with age, non-linearly
Continuing experience with the political system increases partisan attachment
(3) Marked alterations and increases in the nature of partisan cleavages will gradually manifest themselves in the mass electorate
Methodology:
They rely on results from Jennings' 4-wave panel study, after which they use simulations to generate expectations about how these developments play out across cohorts, issues and time. These expectations are evaluated through a cohort analysis of NES data (1972-2004). They do this because although the 4-wave socialization panel data can test propositions about the strengthening of political attitudes and the relationship between these attitudes and partisanship as individuals age, they can't capture the emergence and evolution of partisanship/issue ties across multiple cohorts coming of age under different configurations of issue-based party cleavages.
The Stability of Political Affiliations and Attitudes
Less attitudinal continuity evident as the youth aged from 18 to 26. Continuity more pronounced over the next decade. Gains remained in place as youth aged from 35-50 à "plateauing" effect
Make-shift life span ordering: Then they combine ("splice") the youth and parent panels. In 8 of the 11 measures, there are early gains then gradual increases or little or no change over the remaining years.
3 exceptions:
(1) Parental PID stability substantially exceeds that found in the younger generation
(2) Much lower parental stability with respect to the newer issues represented by evaluation of the women's movement and the legalization of marijuana
The Linkage of Issue Positions and Party Identification
*The findings are in Table 2. They find a dramatic rise with respect to ideological identification over time. Plausible hypotheses include: (1) political learning processes associated with aging and (2) period effects associated with more distinctive partisan divisions. They will test these next.
Simulating Developmental and Period Effects in Party-Issue Constraint
(1) The first scenario assumes the party's positions were constant between 1930-2000, and they find the extent of the party cleavage in the electorate, indexed by the average constraint coefficient is constant over time.
(2) The second scenario assumes the party's positions diverged after 1970, and they find (a) the older cohorts are less responsive, less open to change than are the younger cohorts and (b) cohort differences grow over time. Whereas initial cohort differences are inconsequential, they are dramatic at the end of the period and display a pronounced curvilinear pattern. The highest level of constraint occurs in the 1970 cohort, which was just coming of age when the new party difference emerged.
(3) It is the interaction of life cycle, developmental process and a new political environment that?eventually?produces a distinctive "70s generation."
In this simulation the party difference emerges in 1970 and is stable subsequently. Nevertheless, the population continues to polarize on the issues for three reasons.
First, the operation of developmental processes, as people slowly adjust to the new political reality by modifying their issue attitudes and/or partisan affiliations.
Second, it reflects the process of population replacement in that new entrants to the polity evidence more constraint than do those who are exiting.
Third, and most interestingly, the heightened polarization reflects the interaction between generation formation and developmental processes. At first, new entrants look hardly more polarized than those exiting. But the polity is losing people who do not develop and is replacing them with people who do develop as they age. As a result, the population replacement engine produces effects that are increasingly felt as the developmental process plays itself out. Overall, partisan polarization in the 2000 electorate is the consequence of an event taking place thirty years earlier, an event whose full effects will not be felt until well after the pre-1970s cohorts are fully replaced.
(3) In the final simulation, the party difference is modeled as emerging in 1970 and then continuing to expand. The patterns found in this case (Table 5) are similar to those seen in table 4, with four significant differences.
First, constraint grows more rapidly over time within each cohort.
Second, constraint develops even more quickly for new cohorts facing a highly polarized partisan environment than for those facing a moderately polarized partisan environment, producing cohort differences not seen in Table 4.
Third, and as a consequence, enhanced cross-sectional cohort differences appear, especially as time passes.
Finally, the overall partisan polarization level grows at a faster rate than seen in the previous simulation, and by 2000 is larger.
The Rise of Partisan Polarization in the Electorate
*Table 7 contains the results.Results demonstrate that individuals develop greater consistency between their partisan affiliation and their issue commitment as they age, with the greatest gains usually coming in early adulthood. They also suggest that party differences on these longstanding issues have been growing, in contrast to the steady state modeled in simulation one.
Race and gender issues: The pattern changes where party divergence came in the 1960s and early 1970s (second panel of Table 7). As with our second and third simulations, cohort differences are initially minimal, as the 1972-1976 column shows, but eventually become pronounced and assume a curvilinear shape.
Patterning for these issues is similar to that found for the New Deal issues.
First, constraint gains are typically highest in early adulthood.
Second, each succeeding cohort is entering the electorate with a closer alignment between their party affiliation and their views on race and gender issues. As a consequence, by the last surveys the younger cohorts look very much like those who preceded them, save for the oldest cohort.
Results more striking for cultural issues index.
(1) Constraint levels begin at near zero in 1972-1976 for all cohorts. They climb steadily across the period, but especially for the cohort coming of age in the mid-1970s. The older cohorts lag behind; they have too much political experience from another era. The younger cohorts lag behind; they have not yet developed crystallized partisan or other political attitudes.
(2) Initial cohort differences: Each succeeding cohort entering the electorate shows higher constraint levels than the proceeding one. The partisanship of Americans socialized before the 1960s, has been, and remains, primarily tied to their positions on New Deal issues that have long divided the parties. The results for the youngest cohort are especially striking in the prominence of cultural issues, where the coefficient nearly matches that found for the New Deal issues.
The "new" issues involving race, gender, and culture, taken together, are becoming ever more important over time and across generation without supplanting traditional issue concerns.
As new entrants face a political environment where the partisan differences are not only evident on more issues but are also becoming clearer, partisan affiliations become increasingly aligned with a diverse set of issue commitments. Simultaneously, the power of cultural issues in defining Americans' partisanship is beginning to outweigh that of issues concerning race and gender.
In the 1970s and 1980s opinions on cultural issues were mostly disconnected from partisan affiliations, though attitudes about race and gender were seemingly influential. By the late 1980s and especially in the past decade, the pattern has reversed.
For each cohort save one the connection between cultural issues has grown stronger and has come to outstrip the connection based on race and gender issues.
Cultural issues in the electorate can only be expected to exacerbate the partisan cleavage, especially as new impressionable generations enter the electorate replacing those for whom cultural issues have little bearing on their partisan affiliations.
Conclusion:
The study of general age-related political maturations processes, life-cycle events and secular movements is important for what it reveals about individuals and the political system. The American electorate will reflect changes in political parties, but it may take some time before these changes emerge. Those who come of age when new party division emerge will be the strongest among all age groups. If party differences become increasingly accentuated over time, the "constraint" levels of young adults will match or exceed those of their politically experienced elders.
The general public has adopted elite-level partisan cleavages over time, but there isn't a simple explanation for this phenomenon. Over the past 30-40 years, there has been an interaction effect among (1) generational replacement of those less polarized by those more polarized, (2) increased polarization at the individual level over time and (3) by the conjunction of these mechanisms as the population became increasingly composed of cohorts that entered the electorate in the wake of new party divisions.
Put differently, "Beneath the clear over-time growth in ideological differences between Democrats and Republicans in the electorate is a dynamic process that varies across time, across issues, and across generations" (Jennings & Stoker, 2008, 24).
There is a historical explanation for the emergence of partisan polarization in the electorate, and for the prominent variation across cohorts as of 1996-2004.
Implications:
Partisan polarization likely to increase (issues: race, gender and cultural matters). Americans' opinions strongly linked with Party ID. This isn't likely to change.
Research Opportunities:
(1) What cues are the public receiving about party differences? Origin of cues?
(2) Does the simple top-down representation of the elite-mass influence process miss dynamics working the other way?
(3) More complete explanations (e.g. political awareness and engagement) for how people develop over the life cycle (other than aging).
(4) Causal mechanisms: Is party ID shaping issue commitments? This would signal partisan polarization and realignment. Or are issue commitments shaping party ID? How does the strength of pre-adult socialization moderate causal dynamics? How do influence flows vary by age? Across generations?
(5) Generalizability across polities?How well does our model (and dynamics we have developed) apply to the party contexts outside of the US? Will be contingent on character, stability of political parties competing within a nation.
Jennings (2006) Gender Gaps in Attitudes and Beliefs
This study looks at attitudes about women's societal role within generations as they age and across generations.
Two variants of the gap:
(1) Longitudinal: The difference in support between men and women across generations at different points in time (focuses on change overtime across generations).
(2) Contemporaneous: The difference in support between men and women at a given time (looks at changes within generations over time).
The three samples:
(1) pre-movement
(2) during the movement
(3) post-movement
This study adds much to other studies that look at the gender gap, but do not consider longitudinal samples or multiple generations:
(1) replicated and multiple indicators or relevant attitudes within the same surveys
(2) developments across the life span
(3) multiple generations coming of age in discrete historical eras
(4) observations of pre-adults
Indicators of attitudes of attitudes about the political role of women:
(1) opinions about women;s place in the home v the public sphere
(2) support for the women;s movement
(3) beliefs about the current influence of women and men in public life
Three possible perspectives on the direction and magnitude of gender gaps across time and over generations:
(1) generation effects
-which can result from compositional differences across gens.
-or from birth cohorts which experience different political histories (which would be the generational-units that mannheim talks about).
(2) period effects
-reflect the impact of events and movements in the external world.
-fall more or less equully on all politically aware segments of the population; but period effects fall more heavily on the young, who are more impressionable than the resistant old. "In terms of the present analysis, period effects would be implicated if we fin that individuals from separate generations are moving in the same direction with respect to a belief in gender equality" (195). Do period effects fall equally on men and women?
(3) life-cycle effects
-as one ages certain beliefs become more tamped down or exacerbated, across genernations; i.e. people get more conservative as they age, CW. (see Sears 1990 for a study looking at whether attitudes become more resistant to change as individuals age).
METHODS
bla bla
FINDINGS:
-support for equal role of women in society:
*the increase is support is higher among women than men
*gen 1 women (43-59)= 17%; gen 3 women (23ish) = 74% (57% increase)
*1997 survey of men who grew up during the movement and their sons (post-movement) = fathers 8% more supportive. "Thus in contrast to women, with a more or less stead incrase or sustain suport across generations and time, support among men receded in the post-movement generation.." (200).
Two variants of the gap:
(1) Longitudinal: The difference in support between men and women across generations at different points in time (focuses on change overtime across generations).
(2) Contemporaneous: The difference in support between men and women at a given time (looks at changes within generations over time).
The three samples:
(1) pre-movement
(2) during the movement
(3) post-movement
This study adds much to other studies that look at the gender gap, but do not consider longitudinal samples or multiple generations:
(1) replicated and multiple indicators or relevant attitudes within the same surveys
(2) developments across the life span
(3) multiple generations coming of age in discrete historical eras
(4) observations of pre-adults
Indicators of attitudes of attitudes about the political role of women:
(1) opinions about women;s place in the home v the public sphere
(2) support for the women;s movement
(3) beliefs about the current influence of women and men in public life
Three possible perspectives on the direction and magnitude of gender gaps across time and over generations:
(1) generation effects
-which can result from compositional differences across gens.
-or from birth cohorts which experience different political histories (which would be the generational-units that mannheim talks about).
(2) period effects
-reflect the impact of events and movements in the external world.
-fall more or less equully on all politically aware segments of the population; but period effects fall more heavily on the young, who are more impressionable than the resistant old. "In terms of the present analysis, period effects would be implicated if we fin that individuals from separate generations are moving in the same direction with respect to a belief in gender equality" (195). Do period effects fall equally on men and women?
(3) life-cycle effects
-as one ages certain beliefs become more tamped down or exacerbated, across genernations; i.e. people get more conservative as they age, CW. (see Sears 1990 for a study looking at whether attitudes become more resistant to change as individuals age).
METHODS
bla bla
FINDINGS:
-support for equal role of women in society:
*the increase is support is higher among women than men
*gen 1 women (43-59)= 17%; gen 3 women (23ish) = 74% (57% increase)
*1997 survey of men who grew up during the movement and their sons (post-movement) = fathers 8% more supportive. "Thus in contrast to women, with a more or less stead incrase or sustain suport across generations and time, support among men receded in the post-movement generation.." (200).
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Mannheim (1972) The Problem of Generations
Generations: membership is based upon consciousness belonging to one generation. Unlike concrete groups (i.e. family, tribe, sect), membership of a generation is not deliberate. The ties between members of a generation have not resulted in a concrete group; "the unity of a generation is constitutied essentialy by a similarity of laction of a number of individuals within a social whole.
An additional component of generational membership is "participation in the common destiny of this historical and social unit (118). For example, the peasants of Prussia and young people in China share a potential capability for being sucked into the vortex of social change, yet does not necessarily mean they will equailly take part or be exposed [is there a FURTHER distinction then in taking part and being exposed?].
Membership of a generation is important because "individuals who beolng to the same generation, who share the same year of birth, are endowed to that extent with a common location in the historical dimension of the social process" (105).
Understanding a generation as a "social location"
"The fact of belonging to the same class, and that of belonging to the same generation or age group, have this in common, that both endow the individuals sharing in them with a common location in the social and historical process and thereby limit them to a specific range of potential experience, predisposing them for a certain characteristic mode of thought and experience and a characteristic type of historically relevant action" (106).
Much like your class membership determine your access, it also determines your approach to material, the world, events, etc. For example, events affect everyone. Yet they affect everyone differently depending upon the timing of the event; the youngest politically aware generation during 9/11 and the oldest generation were socialized differently by 9/11. Whereas for older individuals the event either solidified or weakened PRIOR beliefs, for those most young the event was the primary socializing event they had yet encountered, and from there-on-out the way they view preceding events will be colored by their influential 9/11 experience. The same could be argued for those whom it was most salient for (those living in NY or those who lost someone) also look through a lens drastically colored by the tragedy. "The fact that people are born at the same time, or that their youth, adulthood, and old age coincide, does not in itself involve similarity of location; what does create a similar location is that they are in a position to experience the same events and data, etc., and especially that these experiences impinge upon a similarly "stratified" consciousness" (112). "...mere contemporaneity becomes sociologically significant only when it also involved participation in the same historical and social circumstance" (113). This is why the same age groups of Chinese and Germans are necessarily socialized the same. "Early impressions tend to coalesce into a natural view of the world. All later experiences then tend to receive their meaning from this original set, whether they appear as that set's verification and fulfillment or as its negation and antithesis" (113). "If we bear in mind that every concrete experience acquireds its particular face and form from its relation to the primary stratum of experiences from which all others receive their meaning, we can appreciate its importance for the further development of the human consciousness" (114).
The "polar" components of life shift, depending on the generation. All later experience recieve their meaning from the primary experiencetial stratum of earliest experiences of mankind.
----
Two ways in which the past is incorperated into the future:
(1) as consciously recoginized models on which men pattern their behavior (for example, revolutions after the French Revolution modeled themselves after the FR)
(2) as unconsciously condensed merely implicit or virtual patterns.
--------------
Two types of memories:
(1) appropriated (rake memories from someone else)
(2) personially acquired (personal memories, derived from experience): the knowledge gained from personally acquired memories is the only knowledge that "sticks" (111). "...one is old primarily insofar as he comes to live within a specific, individually acquired, framework of usable past experience, so that every new experience has its form and its place largely marked out for it in advance" (111). "In youth, on the other hand, FORMATIVE FORCES ARE JUST COMING INTO BEING, and basic atiudes in the process of development can take advantage of the molding power of new sitiations" (111).
SOCIAL REJUVENATION (112)
The only way to "start fresh" is by a new birth. "Their being young, the "freshness" of their contact with the work, manifest themlves in the fact that they are able to re-orient any movement they embrace, to adolt it to the total situation" (footnote 112).
Stratification of life experiences.
Teacher-pupil reciprocal relationship (116):
Older generations are able to absorb some of the younger generations' concerns; especially those old enough to relinquish their original approach.
-----
Generational units:
generational units represent a much more concrete bond than the actual generation as such. i.e. romantic-conservative youth v. liberation-rationalist youth of the same generation. "youth experiencing the same concrete historical problem may be said to be part of the same actual generation; while those groups within the same actual generation which work up the material of their common experiences in different specific ways constitute separate generation-units" (120).
generational-units have a more binding tie on its members (122).
What produces generational units?
the Gestalt principle?
We always see things already formed in a special way; we think concepts defined in terms of a specific context. Form and context depend, in any case, on the group to which we belong. To become really assimilated into a group invovles more than mere acceptance of its characerist values--it in volves the ability to see things frm its particular "aspect" to endow concepts with its particular share of meaing, and it experience psychological and intellectual impulses in the configuation characteristic of the group. In means, futher, to absorb those interpretive formation principles which enable the individual to dea with new imporessions and events in a fashion broadlt predetermined by the group (122).
thus generational units can form based on the heighten participation in an event, where others in your generation lay low. End result? a number of generational-units making up one generation.
page 124...
An additional component of generational membership is "participation in the common destiny of this historical and social unit (118). For example, the peasants of Prussia and young people in China share a potential capability for being sucked into the vortex of social change, yet does not necessarily mean they will equailly take part or be exposed [is there a FURTHER distinction then in taking part and being exposed?].
Membership of a generation is important because "individuals who beolng to the same generation, who share the same year of birth, are endowed to that extent with a common location in the historical dimension of the social process" (105).
Understanding a generation as a "social location"
"The fact of belonging to the same class, and that of belonging to the same generation or age group, have this in common, that both endow the individuals sharing in them with a common location in the social and historical process and thereby limit them to a specific range of potential experience, predisposing them for a certain characteristic mode of thought and experience and a characteristic type of historically relevant action" (106).
Much like your class membership determine your access, it also determines your approach to material, the world, events, etc. For example, events affect everyone. Yet they affect everyone differently depending upon the timing of the event; the youngest politically aware generation during 9/11 and the oldest generation were socialized differently by 9/11. Whereas for older individuals the event either solidified or weakened PRIOR beliefs, for those most young the event was the primary socializing event they had yet encountered, and from there-on-out the way they view preceding events will be colored by their influential 9/11 experience. The same could be argued for those whom it was most salient for (those living in NY or those who lost someone) also look through a lens drastically colored by the tragedy. "The fact that people are born at the same time, or that their youth, adulthood, and old age coincide, does not in itself involve similarity of location; what does create a similar location is that they are in a position to experience the same events and data, etc., and especially that these experiences impinge upon a similarly "stratified" consciousness" (112). "...mere contemporaneity becomes sociologically significant only when it also involved participation in the same historical and social circumstance" (113). This is why the same age groups of Chinese and Germans are necessarily socialized the same. "Early impressions tend to coalesce into a natural view of the world. All later experiences then tend to receive their meaning from this original set, whether they appear as that set's verification and fulfillment or as its negation and antithesis" (113). "If we bear in mind that every concrete experience acquireds its particular face and form from its relation to the primary stratum of experiences from which all others receive their meaning, we can appreciate its importance for the further development of the human consciousness" (114).
The "polar" components of life shift, depending on the generation. All later experience recieve their meaning from the primary experiencetial stratum of earliest experiences of mankind.
----
Two ways in which the past is incorperated into the future:
(1) as consciously recoginized models on which men pattern their behavior (for example, revolutions after the French Revolution modeled themselves after the FR)
(2) as unconsciously condensed merely implicit or virtual patterns.
--------------
Two types of memories:
(1) appropriated (rake memories from someone else)
(2) personially acquired (personal memories, derived from experience): the knowledge gained from personally acquired memories is the only knowledge that "sticks" (111). "...one is old primarily insofar as he comes to live within a specific, individually acquired, framework of usable past experience, so that every new experience has its form and its place largely marked out for it in advance" (111). "In youth, on the other hand, FORMATIVE FORCES ARE JUST COMING INTO BEING, and basic atiudes in the process of development can take advantage of the molding power of new sitiations" (111).
SOCIAL REJUVENATION (112)
The only way to "start fresh" is by a new birth. "Their being young, the "freshness" of their contact with the work, manifest themlves in the fact that they are able to re-orient any movement they embrace, to adolt it to the total situation" (footnote 112).
Stratification of life experiences.
Teacher-pupil reciprocal relationship (116):
Older generations are able to absorb some of the younger generations' concerns; especially those old enough to relinquish their original approach.
-----
Generational units:
generational units represent a much more concrete bond than the actual generation as such. i.e. romantic-conservative youth v. liberation-rationalist youth of the same generation. "youth experiencing the same concrete historical problem may be said to be part of the same actual generation; while those groups within the same actual generation which work up the material of their common experiences in different specific ways constitute separate generation-units" (120).
generational-units have a more binding tie on its members (122).
What produces generational units?
the Gestalt principle?
We always see things already formed in a special way; we think concepts defined in terms of a specific context. Form and context depend, in any case, on the group to which we belong. To become really assimilated into a group invovles more than mere acceptance of its characerist values--it in volves the ability to see things frm its particular "aspect" to endow concepts with its particular share of meaing, and it experience psychological and intellectual impulses in the configuation characteristic of the group. In means, futher, to absorb those interpretive formation principles which enable the individual to dea with new imporessions and events in a fashion broadlt predetermined by the group (122).
thus generational units can form based on the heighten participation in an event, where others in your generation lay low. End result? a number of generational-units making up one generation.
page 124...
Friday, May 23, 2008
Campbell (2002) The Young and Realigning: A Test of the Socialization Theory of Realignment Theory
Abstract: Recent research has demonstrated that Democrats and Republicans are divided along religious line—religiously committed voters (Protestant and Catholic) identify as Republicans, while secularly oriented voters are more likely to be Democrats. This presents an excellent opportunity to test an implication of the Michigan model of party identification—that, in a realigning period, it is young voters who are more likely to reflect the new electoral cleavage. Using the Monitoring the Future archives of over 230,000 surveys administered to high school seniors from 1976-1996, I offer evidence that there is a sharp partisan divide defined by religious commitment among youth just on the cusp of obtaining the franchise. Furthermore, data from the NES (1980-98) confirm that the link between religiosity and Republican Party ID is stronger among younger than older voters.
Excellent opportunity to test Realignment Theory because there is a division—between religiously committed and secularly oriented voters. Are younger voters more likely to realign along religious versus secular lines—as literature on party identification and realignment suggests they should.
Realignment:
Observable changes in mass political behavior as the coalitions comprising the Republicans and Democrats shifts; there are periods in American history when the divisions between the parties are defined in a new way.
--Party ID
--Religion
Independent variables:
-party ID (choose your political preference—strong to weak democrat/republican)
-religious affiliation
-church attendance
-religious salience
-sociodemographic measures
The MTF measure?
--religiosity measure: (1) participation in religious community, (2) salience of religious beliefs
In the late 1970s, religiosity measures and correlation with the GOP is low… as the 1990s get along
Campbell (2002) The Young and Realigning: A Test of the Socialization Theory of Realignment Theory
Excellent opportunity to test Realignment Theory because there is a division—between religiously committed and secularly oriented voters. Are younger voters more likely to realign along religious versus secular lines—as literature on party identification and realignment suggests they should.
Realignment:
Observable changes in mass political behavior as the coalitions comprising the Republicans and Democrats shifts; there are periods in American history when the divisions between the parties are defined in a new way.
--Party ID
--Religion
Independent variables:
-party ID (choose your political preference—strong to weak democrat/republican)
-religious affiliation
-church attendance
-religious salience
-sociodemographic measures
The MTF measure?
--religiosity measure: (1) participation in religious community, (2) salience of religious beliefs
In the late 1970s, religiosity measures and correlation with the GOP is low… as the 1990s get along
Campbell (2002) The Young and Realigning: A Test of the Socialization Theory of Realignment Theory
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Ingelhart & Abramson (1994) Economic Security and Value Change
Abstract: Confirming Inglehart’s prediction (1971) of an intergenerational...
A theory of value change, from materialist values (economic and physical security) to post-materialist values (freedom, self-expression) on account of life-cycle effects or intergenerational change.
Life cycle effects: change in values as you age
Intergenerational change: change in values between younger generations and older generations on account of birthright.
Two hypotheses that predict changing values:
Socialization hypothesis: one’s basic values reflect the conditions that prevailed in one’s pre-adult years.
Scarcity hypothesis: an individual’s priorities reflect one’s socioeconomic environment.
Short-term and Long-term value change:
Short-term value changes function like period effects; periods of prosperity lead to postmaterialism during the prosperity. Long-term value changes function like cohort effects; cohorts experience prosperity, develop values, and maintain those values, as a cohort.
Ingelhar's thesis predicts only model gains of about one point per year in post-materialism, since he argues that the trend is driven by generational replacement (long-term value change possible). If generational replacement were the only factor influencing value change, the trend toward postmaterialism would be similar in all these societies, since the speed of generational replacement varies only slightly from country to county.
yet the authors here provide additional evidence using cohort analysis and using two pieice of side information: (1) taking into consideration periods on economic ressession experienced by the countries, and (2) these economic conditions would result in a downward shift toward materialism.
findings:
The rise in the overall percentage difference index occurs because during these 22 yers the older, more materialistic cohorts were gradually dying and being replaced by younger, more postmaterialist cohorts. These results make clear that geernational replacement is a major force driving postmaterialism upward. in otherwards, gradually gains postmaterialism result mainly from the gradual exit of the older cohorts through death.
Yet short-term period effects are also present. In none of the 8 European societies none of them show a simple linear progression toward post-materialism.
Results show that materialist and non-materialist values wax and wane with economic prosperity (also predicted by Inglehart's theory); inflation and postmaterialist values move in tandem, as predicted.
A theory of value change, from materialist values (economic and physical security) to post-materialist values (freedom, self-expression) on account of life-cycle effects or intergenerational change.
Life cycle effects: change in values as you age
Intergenerational change: change in values between younger generations and older generations on account of birthright.
Two hypotheses that predict changing values:
Socialization hypothesis: one’s basic values reflect the conditions that prevailed in one’s pre-adult years.
Scarcity hypothesis: an individual’s priorities reflect one’s socioeconomic environment.
Short-term and Long-term value change:
Short-term value changes function like period effects; periods of prosperity lead to postmaterialism during the prosperity. Long-term value changes function like cohort effects; cohorts experience prosperity, develop values, and maintain those values, as a cohort.
Ingelhar's thesis predicts only model gains of about one point per year in post-materialism, since he argues that the trend is driven by generational replacement (long-term value change possible). If generational replacement were the only factor influencing value change, the trend toward postmaterialism would be similar in all these societies, since the speed of generational replacement varies only slightly from country to county.
yet the authors here provide additional evidence using cohort analysis and using two pieice of side information: (1) taking into consideration periods on economic ressession experienced by the countries, and (2) these economic conditions would result in a downward shift toward materialism.
findings:
The rise in the overall percentage difference index occurs because during these 22 yers the older, more materialistic cohorts were gradually dying and being replaced by younger, more postmaterialist cohorts. These results make clear that geernational replacement is a major force driving postmaterialism upward. in otherwards, gradually gains postmaterialism result mainly from the gradual exit of the older cohorts through death.
Yet short-term period effects are also present. In none of the 8 European societies none of them show a simple linear progression toward post-materialism.
Results show that materialist and non-materialist values wax and wane with economic prosperity (also predicted by Inglehart's theory); inflation and postmaterialist values move in tandem, as predicted.
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