Abstract
AbstractThis study aims to illuminate the importance of social, political, and economic capital in American presidential campaigns and elections. Regarding Donald Trump's unexpected win by national polls and the continued controversy arising out of his particular brand of populism, the study compares Trump's and Clinton's values shared with voters across multidimensional social, political, and economic capital during the 2016 presidential campaigns. Utilizing the capital indexes constructed by the researcher's pilot surveys and the hybrid measure of capital warmth formulated in the proposed model, this study explores voters' open‐ended answers about the Republican Party candidate, Donald Trump, and the Democratic Party candidate, Hillary Clinton, that were collected by the American National Election Studies prior to the 2016 presidential election. The study found that Clinton's political and economic capital resources, especially her political reputation and functional ability, more significantly contributed to her voters' support, voting, and confidence. However, in contrast to Clinton's strength in political capital, Trump cultivated relatively more and stronger social capital that contributed to his voters' support, choice, and voting strength. Trump's social capital overpowered Clinton's political capital and appeared to be a feasible answer for “Trumpism” in the 2016 American presidential election.
Published Version
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