The System Works Fine: The Positive Relationship Between Emphasis on Individual Explanations for Inequality and External Political Efficacy

Joe Greenwood-Hau

doi:10.3389/fpos.2021.643165

Abstract

This article addresses the largely overlooked question of whether explanations for inequality are related to appraisals of the political system. It posits a positive relationship between individual explanations for inequality and three indicators of appraisals of the political system: satisfaction with democracy, political trust, and external political efficacy. Individual explanations for inequality are a form of system justifying belief and constitute part of a wider ideological view of the status quo social order as just and defensible. This positive view of the functioning of society may flow over into appraisals of the political system, imply a positive disposition towards high-status groups including politicians, and remove the motivation to blame the political system for ongoing inequality (which is instead seen in a positive, meritocratic light). The relationships between explanations for inequality and appraisals of the political system are tested for the first time in the United States, using 2002 ANES data, and in Great Britain, using data from a survey fielded in 2014. The results in the United States show few consistent or significant relationships between explanations for inequality and any of the appraisals of the political system. However, the results in Great Britain show consistent, robust, and statistically significant positive relationships between individual explanations for inequality and external political efficacy. The inconsistency in these results may stem from the differing temporal and national contexts of the surveys. It is also likely that the ranking measures of explanations for inequality in the GB data distinguished respondents for whom individual explanations are particularly important, who have a less negative appraisal of external political efficacy. However, more work is required to investigate the effects of question format, the impact of national and temporal context, and the causal direction of the relationship between explanations for inequality and appraisals of the political system.

Highlights

This article addresses the question of whether explanations for inequality are related to appraisals of the political system
When asked to rank explanations for inequality, people who emphasise individual causes tend to be less negative in their assessments of external political efficacy than are people who emphasise structural explanations
They are apt to think of the responsiveness of the political system and those who inhabit it in less negative terms

Summary

INTRODUCTION

This article addresses the question of whether explanations for inequality are related to appraisals of the political system. Contextual factors with positive implications for political trust include elections (Echeverría and Mani, 2020), good government performance (Catterberg and Moreno, 2006; Seyd, 2015; Citrin and Stoker, 2018), sociotropic economic performance and social provision (Ellinas and Lamprianou, 2014; Hooghe et al, 2017), as well as both income equality and perceived distributional fairness (Zmerli and Castillo, 2015) Such perceptions are more important in countries with lower levels of inequality, indicating the interaction of contextual and individual effects. Given that it is a general tendency, people who have a positive view of the social system, manifested in individual explanations for inequality, may see the functioning of the political system as just, fair, and meritocratic These views may flow into their appraisals of the political system, manifested in satisfaction with democracy, political trust, and external political efficacy. This check can be reproduced using the replication files linked to at the end of the article

Satisfied

Very important

Discussion

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Background

GENERAL DISCUSSION

CONCLUSION

Findings

DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT

ETHICS STATEMENT