Mass Political Participation Research Articles

Community Size and Participation By Lawyers in Community Politics

Community size has received some attention as a variable affecting the characteristics of a political system. Positive findings indicate that community size is related to type of governmental structure1 and to mass political participation.2 Contrarily, it has been found to be unrelated to the type of community power structure.3 In a study of New England communities, community size was found to be related to the amount of political participation by lawyers; almost all lawyers in smaller towns were politically active at some time during their careers, while those in larger cities were divided between the politically active and the politically inactive.4 This paper offers additional evidence to substantiate this last finding and attempts to relate it to a more general theory of differential political participation. The findings reported are from a study of lawyers' participation in politics carried out in the summer of 1965 in four counties of upstate New York. The counties included one with a total population of more than 400,000, one with a population of about 50,000, and two with populations of approximately 10,000 each. They were in the same general geographic location, and were chosen for both proximity to one another and variation in population size. The complete population of lawyers in the four counties was surveyed. The largest county had 867 lawyers, the medium-sized

Social Structure and Political Participation: Developmental Relationships, II

Mass political participation increases as nations become more economically developed. In Part I of this study we attempted to identify the significant social experiences which explain the high levels of participation in economically developed nations. We formulated and explored the following general theory:Economic development alters the social structure of a nation. As nations become more economically developed, three major changes occur: (1) the relative size of the upper and middle classes becomes greater; (2) larger numbers of citizens are concentrated in the urban areas; and (3) the density and complexity of economic and secondary organizations increases. These social changes imply political changes. Greater proportions of the population find themselves in life situations which lead to increased political information, political awareness, sense of personal political efficacy, and other relevant attitudes. These attitude changes, in turn, lead to increases in political participation.The theory can be presented schematically in the following form:We were able to demonstrate that individuals' levels of social status and organizational involvement were strongly and consistently related to their levels of political participation. The survey data from five nations showed, further, that organizational involvement was more strongly related to participation, and more consistently from nation to nation, than was social status.