A Cultural Theory of Partisanship and Policy Attitudes

Matthew C. Nowlin and Thomas M. Rabovsky

Social Science Quarterly, 2020, vol. 101, issue 2, 878-892

Abstract: Objective Political parties provide an important function for a public that is generally seen as not consistently ideological by guiding its thinking about policy issues. In this article, we examine whether the four cultural worldviews derived from grid‐group cultural theory—hierarch, egalitarian, individualist, and fatalist—are predictive of partisan attachments and perceptions of climate change risk among the public. Methods Data come from an original survey of the U.S. public conducted in 2011 and 2012. We use regression analysis to examine partisanship and perceived climate change risk; ordered logit to examine party attachment; and mediation analysis to examine the mediating effect of partisanship on cultural worldviews and climate change risk. Results We find that the group‐oriented cultural types (egalitarians and hierarchs) are more likely to have stronger party attachments than the nongroup‐oriented cultural types (individualists and fatalists). In addition, we find that the mediation effect of party is more pronounced among the group‐oriented types than the nongroup oriented. Conclusion Grid‐group cultural theory is predictive of both partisanship and policy attitudes and partisanship mediates the influence of cultural worldviews on climate change risk, particularly for those types with group orientations.

Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/ssqu.12750

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:socsci:v:101:y:2020:i:2:p:878-892

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0038-4941

Access Statistics for this article

Social Science Quarterly is currently edited by Robert L. Lineberry

More articles in Social Science Quarterly from Southwestern Social Science Association
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().