Abstract
In previous research on political tolerance in West Germany I found that respondents'level of education had no statistically significant effect on a number of variables measuring tolerance. This result seemed to contradict standard findings for populations of democratic countries. Therefore, this article explicitly compares tolerance of free speech for nonconformists in America using replications of Samuel Stouffer's benchmark questions (National Opinion Research Center surveys in 1972 and 1977) with very similar—but not identical—questions asked in West German national surveys in 1970 and 1979. These questions concern tolerance for a communist, an atheist, and a neo-Nazi/militarist speaker. Using log-linear models to analyze scales of these questions and of the disaggregated tolerance items, the initial findings were confirmed: education has little effect on tolerance in West Germany, but considerable effect in the U.S. The influence of generational cohort, occupation, left—right ideological self-placement, party preference, country, and time are also tested. Semantic and historical explanations for the findings are briefly discussed.
Published Version
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