State Public Opinion Research Articles

Friedl, Ji. ei a Pol´ci na Tnsku, 1945–1949 (review)

SEER, 92, 3, JULY 2014 572 The chief difficulty of writing about propaganda is how to evaluate its success. The key questions here are how much difference did it make, and would the peoples of the Soviet Union have behaved differently had the regime allowed a more liberal public discourse. It is almost impossible to know, since in a totalitarian state public opinion cannot be measured. It is not surprising, therefore, that Berkhoff is unable to answer these questions definitively, but in his examination of them he seems to underestimate the genuine patriotism of the people of the Soviet Union, and the Russians in particular. Many, including Stalin, rightly pointed out that although Russians suffered somewhat less than Ukrainians or Byelorussians, since the fighting took place necessarily to a greater extent in the borderlands, their willingness to fight was nevertheless greater than that of other peoples. In answer to how far propaganda was successful, it can be argued that people heard what they wanted to hear. Also, writers and filmmakers said what they wanted to; they were not coerced, they did not lie. That this happened to coincide with what the Bolshevik leadership wanted them to say created during the war years what could be described, in this sense, and only in this sense, as an oasis of freedom. This coincidence of purpose — the goals of the regime with the convictions of the individual — helps to explain how, after so many years, people still recall this period of extraordinary suffering with pride and nostalgia. It could be that during the war years control was in fact increased. Unlike pre-war propaganda that described a world that never existed which the people well knew did not exist, during the war when newspapers and films and writers spoke about the bestiality of the Germans and the necessity of resisting them, it made immediate and good sense and was received by a willing audience. Peasants who had lost their lands to the Bolsheviks took on their foreign foe enthusiastically. Similarly, former labour camp internees fought bitterly against the enemy. At one point Berkhoff places liberation in quotation marks, but I think he is very much mistaken, since for this short while liberation meant, for many, genuine liberation. University of California, Santa Cruz Peter Kenez Friedl, Jiří. Češi a Poláci na Těšínsku, 1945–1949. Historický ústav AV ČR and Conditio humana, Prague and Brno, 2012. 314 pp. Map. Illustrations. Notes. Bibliography. Indexes. CZK 432.00. Teschen Silesia, partitioned at the Paris Peace Conference in 1920, was to become a bone of contention between Czechoslovakia and Poland during the entire interwar period. In 1938, Poland benefited from Czechoslovakia’s REVIEWS 573 precarious position and the forced cession of its disputed borderland. Both states lost sovereignty only a few months later, to be fully restored only after the fall of Nazi Germany. Under these circumstances, nation-state thinking, prevalent in Central Europe, was to generate a clash of allies which is still little known to international scholars. Jiří Friedl, an authority on Teschen Silesia and Czechoslovak-Polish relations, here considers the post-war co-existence of Czechs and Poles. His in-depth research combines material from central and regional archives plus a rich literature on what is a complex scenario. Reviewing the history of this lengthy conflict, Friedl, although conscious of the emotions his subject can generate, aims to provide a balanced analysis of this complicated history, even though it may sometimes be difficult to sustain (e.g. pp. 95, 99). The spring and summer of 1945 saw a ‘zero hour’ in Teschen Silesia. Each nation waited for restoration, each with divergent aspirations. The 1938 Munich crisis constituted an axis: whereas the Czechs linked Polish rule directly to the Great Power agreement, now ‘null and void’, the Warsaw authorities (and the Teschen Poles) disagreed. Friedl points out that the Poles failed adequately to predict the trauma of ‘Munich’ (p. 61), appropriating the region in its ‘thrust to the West’. Both sides appealed to their Soviet arch-ally, but it was probably due to the better position held by the Czechoslovak Communists that the Red Army came to the assistance of the Czech and...

Berkhoff, Karel C. Motherland in Danger: Soviet Propaganda during World War II (review)

REVIEWS 571 Additionally, and on a relatively minor note, several place and proper names are misspelled throughout the book. Notwithstanding these issues, Yeomans’s book should make an important contribution to the evolving debates about the Second World War in former Yugoslavia. Carleton University, Ottowa Mark Biondich Berkhoff, Karel C. Motherland in Danger: Soviet Propaganda during World War II. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA and London, 2012. 407 pp. Notes. Sources. Index. $35.00: £25.00. This is an excellent guide to Second World War Soviet propaganda. Demonstrating a thorough knowledge of the secondary literature, Berkhoff’s study also draws extensively on primary sources, including newspapers, pamphlets, literature and films, unearthing fresh and interesting material from the archives. As a result, his account is both informed and nuanced. For example, Berkhoff shows that, contrary to accepted thought, Soviet propaganda did in fact mention that the Nazis had a ‘special policy’ regarding the Jews. Whilst their suffering was generally under-emphasized, on occasion Soviet writers did, nevertheless, single out the Jews as special victims. Similarly, Berkhoff demonstrates that while most of the time propagandists equated Nazis and Germans, they did sometimes make a distinction, and as times and circumstances changed, so did their portrayal of the figure of the German. Berkhoff correctly points out that most of the topics of Soviet propaganda had similarities to that of other warrior nations. The Soviets were not alone in portraying their enemies as sub-human, or paying scant attention to the Holocaust, and their propagandists were not the only ones to stress the need for national unity at a time of danger. Berkhoff’s main argument is hardly controversial. The Soviet regime at the time of war was able to control public discourse to an unprecedented degree. The government, namely Stalin, imposed a uniformity that went way beyond what the Nazis managed to achieve. The Bolsheviks were well prepared: their propaganda machine was functioning well way before the outbreak of the war. War-time simply increased controls. Berkhoff’s contribution to the literature is that he can show in greater detail how far that control went and how it was achieved. Although Berkhoff’s stated aim is to describe Soviet propaganda, a good history of propaganda cannot be separated from the general history of the war, and thus the reader will learn much about the sufferings of the peoples of the Soviet Union, as well as the domestic and foreign policies of the regime. SEER, 92, 3, JULY 2014 572 The chief difficulty of writing about propaganda is how to evaluate its success. The key questions here are how much difference did it make, and would the peoples of the Soviet Union have behaved differently had the regime allowed a more liberal public discourse. It is almost impossible to know, since in a totalitarian state public opinion cannot be measured. It is not surprising, therefore, that Berkhoff is unable to answer these questions definitively, but in his examination of them he seems to underestimate the genuine patriotism of the people of the Soviet Union, and the Russians in particular. Many, including Stalin, rightly pointed out that although Russians suffered somewhat less than Ukrainians or Byelorussians, since the fighting took place necessarily to a greater extent in the borderlands, their willingness to fight was nevertheless greater than that of other peoples. In answer to how far propaganda was successful, it can be argued that people heard what they wanted to hear. Also, writers and filmmakers said what they wanted to; they were not coerced, they did not lie. That this happened to coincide with what the Bolshevik leadership wanted them to say created during the war years what could be described, in this sense, and only in this sense, as an oasis of freedom. This coincidence of purpose — the goals of the regime with the convictions of the individual — helps to explain how, after so many years, people still recall this period of extraordinary suffering with pride and nostalgia. It could be that during the war years control was in fact increased. Unlike pre-war propaganda that described a world that never existed which the people well knew did not exist, during the war when...

Маркетингова діяльність у сфері фізичної культури та спорту як об’єкт соціального пізнання

Мета : вивчити соціальний зміст маркетингової діяльності в системі фізичної культури. Маркетингова діяльність у сфері фізичної культури і спорту розглядається як об’єкт соціального пізнання. Показано значення комерційного й некомерційного маркетингу та його залежності від державної соціальної політики й суспільної думки. З’ясовано значення фізкультурно-спортивних послуг у системі напрямків соціальної політики реалізації соціальних програм. З’ясовано зміст маркетингової діяльності в системі фізичної культури пов’язаний, як з вирішенням класичних питань маркетингу, так і з проблематики, що зумовлено специфікою фізичної культури та спорту як сфери соціальної діяльності. Висновок: Ринок в сфері фізичної культури є біфуркальним та потребує особливого маркетингового підходу, це пов’язане з тим, що необхідно дотримання балансу інтересів двох сторін: кінцевими споживачами (що не мають достатнього рівня платоспроможності) та спонсорами і меценатами, що сплачують за послуги, що надаються кінцевим споживачам. Normal 0 false false false /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:Обычная таблица; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:Times New Roman; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;}

Public Opinion in the U.S. States: 1956 to 2010

AbstractIn this article, we create, validate, and analyze new dynamic measures of state partisanship, state policy mood, and state political ideology. The measures of partisanship and policy mood begin in 1956 and the measure of ideology begins in 1976. Our approach uses the advantages of two leading techniques for measuring state public opinion—multilevel regression and poststratification (MRP) and survey aggregation. The resulting estimates are based on nearly 500 different surveys with a total of more than 740,000 respondents. After validating our measures, we show that during the last half century, policy preferences in the states have shifted in important and sometimes surprising ways. For example, we find that differences in political attitudes across time can be as important as differences across states.

Climate policy at the local level: Insights from California

Local governments in the United States have been hotbeds of climate change activity. Recently, states have sought to incorporate these primarily voluntary actions into broader climate change mitigation programs. Using the example of California, a national leader in U.S. climate policy, this article examines the scope for effectiveness of local climate action and assesses factors related to adoption of local climate policies. The analysis draws on two original surveys of city and county governments, designed to learn about adoption of comprehensive policy tools (emission inventories and climate action plans) and programs in specific areas (energy, water, land use, transportation). Adoption rates are fairly high and growing; by mid 2010 roughly 70% of all jurisdictions were already engaged or planning to engage in comprehensive climate actions, up from roughly 50% in 2008. The adoption of specific programs varies with the degree of local government authority in different sectors, and is generally higher for programs targeting municipal facilities and operations than those targeting residents and businesses. Population size, household income, and strong support from local leaders and the public are all associated with higher rates of adoption, particularly for comprehensive actions. Partisan attitudes are more important for comprehensive actions than for programs in specific areas such as energy efficiency and renewable energy, mirroring the findings of state and national public opinion surveys, which find broader support for actions like clean energy than for explicit climate change-oriented actions. Qualitative analysis reveals additional keys to success, including partnering with other local governments and private organizations and leveraging cost savings and other potential co-benefits of action. As states move to incorporate local actions into broader plans, mandates will also play an increasing role in setting a floor for local efforts.

Using National Surveys to Measure Dynamic U.S. State Public Opinion: A Guideline for Scholars and an Application

AbstractThe author improves on the measurement of U.S. state public opinion by (1) applying previous methods used only on cross-sectional data to create dynamic measures of state public opinion and (2) providing a systematic comparison of the performance of the various methodological approaches on these dynamic measures. The author shows that scholars can use multilevel regression, imputation, and poststratification (MRP) coupled with a simple moving average to measure state public opinion over time. Compared to aggregation, the MRP approach has less error and is more reliable, particularly for the less populated states. The author shows the applicability of the MRP approach by measuring and validating state partisanship and state ideology over time. The validated measures are available for public use. Armed with a method to measure state public opinion over time, scholars can begin to more fully understand the dynamic relationship between public opinion and policy in the U.S. states.

FRAGILE HEGEMONY, FLEXIBLE AUTHORITARIANISM, AND GOVERNING FROM BELOW: POLITICIANS' REPORTS IN EARLY REPUBLICAN TURKEY

AbstractThis article scrutinizes election district and inspection district reports written by the deputies of the Turkish single-party government and the role of these reports in state decision making. Underscoring social discontent and the fragile hegemony of the new regime—both of which motivated the republican elite to monitor state and party administrations and public opinion—the article argues that the practice of reporting was neither a project of social engineering nor a practice peculiar to the Turkish state but rather a requirement of a polity concerned with the opinion of its citizens. In the absence of direct political participation of the people in government, the reports mediated between the state and society. Contrary to conventional accounts of the single-party period, the article argues that the republican elite did not govern the country through top-down decrees but instead sought to ascertain public opinion and its own administrative defects so as to consolidate its fragile hegemony. Based on these findings, I propose that we redefine the early republican state as a flexible authoritarian regime that was not detached from the society.

The Impact of Party Control on the Diffusion of Parental Involvement Laws in the U.S. States

AbstractThe authors examine the impact of political party control of government on the restrictiveness of a U.S. state's abortion policy, measured by the enactment of a parental involvement law. The empirical results show that (1) institutional control of a state's legislative and executive branches of government by the Republican Party increases the likelihood a state will enact a parental involvement law, while Democratic Party control decreases this likelihood; (2) the more conservative state public opinion is on abortion rights, the more likely a state is to enact a parental involvement law; (3) public anti-abortion attitudes do not act as a moderating force on the link between political party control and the enactment of a parental involvement law; and (4) the impact of political party control on the enactment of a parental involvement law has grown larger over time.

More than a Dime's Worth: Using State Party Platforms to Assess the Degree of American Party Polarization

AbstractHow polarized are American political parties? Recently, Kidd used an automated content analysis program to demonstrate that American party platforms reveal only minor policy differences. In contrast to his conclusions, this analysis produces three main findings. First, at the state level, state party platforms reveal considerable ideological differences between the parties. Second, differences in state public opinion do not account for these differences; rather, they are more closely correlated with activist opinions and increases in state party competition. Finally, the conflict is not simply ideological but applies to specific issues in the platforms. As such, American state parties are highly polarized on different measures. Automated content analysis programs clearly represent an important methodological advance in coding political texts, but the results here call attention to the importance of policy and agenda content in party platforms. Moreover, studies of American politics, particularly research focusing on parties and ideological polarization, need to take into account the diversity of agendas that is inherent in a federal party system.

Public versus Private: The Conditional Effect of State Policy and Institutional Trust on Mass Opinion

Is there a link between the size of a country's public sector and attitudes towards privatization and individual responsibility? If so, is this connection conditioned by people's level of trust in institutions? This article uses multilevel analysis to investigate the relationship between state policy and public opinion, using three measures of economic left–right attitudes as dependent variables. My starting point is the adjustment hypothesis. A new postulate based on the theory of cognitive dissonance is presented, which is the conditional adjustment hypothesis. My argument is that when investigating the policy-opinion link, we should not focus on the aggregated public opinion, but rather differentiate according to each individual's level of trust in institutions. The hypotheses are tested using individual-level data that are available from the OECD countries, drawn from the 1990 and 2000 waves of the World Values Survey. The findings of this research indicate that while the adjustment hypothesis is firmly rejected in all models, the conditional adjustment hypothesis receives some support. On the individual level, income proves to be the strongest determinant of left–right opinions.

State Public Opinion, the Death Penalty, and the Practice of Electing Judges

Do state supreme courts act impartially or are they swayed by public opinion? Do judicial elections influence judge behavior? To date these questions have received little direct attention due to the absence of comparable public opinion data in states and obstacles to collecting data necessary for comprehensive analysis of state supreme court outcomes. Advances in measurement, data archiving, and methodology now allow for consideration of the link between public opinion and judicial outcomes in the American states. The analysis presented considers public opinion's influence on the composition of courts (indirect effects) and its influence on judge votes in capital punishment cases (direct effects). In elective state supreme courts, public support for capital punishment influences the ideological composition of those courts and judge willingness to uphold death sentences. Notably, public support for capital punishment has no measurable effect on nonelective state supreme courts. On the highly salient issue of the death penalty, mass opinion and the institution of electing judges systematically influence court composition and judge behavior.

The State of State Polls: Old Challenges, New Opportunities

AbstractThe prospect of a full complement of regularly-conducted, publicly-released state-level polls has both excited and eluded scholars of state politics and public opinion for decades. Here, we examine the current status of state-level polling in the U.S. Specifically, we rely on interviews with 51 state poll directors to investigate the location, frequency, scope, budget, purpose, content, and perceived policy impact of such projects. We also explore the still challenging prospect of greater state-to-state collaboration. We conclude that while current state polling is a robust industry, calls for greater collaboration remain unheeded largely because of limited resources and the incompatible reward structures of project directors. Still, improved data-archiving together with regional polling projects on hot-button topics would serve to diminish such challenges.

Comment: Choosing Among Indicators of State Public Opinion

The lively debate between Berry, Ringquist, Fording, and Hanson (2007, hereafter Berry et al.) and Brace, Arceneaux, Johnson, and Ulbig (2004, hereafter Brace et al.) about the measurement of state public opinion is instructive for scholars of many aspects of state politics and policy. Researchers in need of such a measure now have a variety of choices, but as this debate illustrates, these measures are not simply interchangeable nor can they be used without a good deal of theoretical and methodological thought. Each measure is linked to a different component of state public opinion and each has its limitations. In addition, state policies, and changes in state policies, may have different causal links to these measures depending on policy type, kind of policy change, or environmental factors.

Reply to “The Measurement and Stability of State Citizen Ideology”

Writing this reply presents a challenge for us since the authors of the preceding article reinforce most of our substantive points published previously (Brace et al. 2004, 2006). In this new article, Berry et al. (2007) acknowledge that there is more cross-sectional than longitudinal variation in the Berry et al. (1998) measure of state citizen ideology and imply that researchers should take precautions not to confuse them. They admit that their measure is tapping something different from survey-based self-identification, and they also note the distinction between absolute and relative change in their ideology measure. Given our many points of agreement, this reply focuses on four key points made by Berry et al. in the preceding article on which we differ. First, we address the argument that focusing on intra-state attitude change ignores important attitude change affecting all states simultaneously. Second, we discuss Berry et al.‘s distinction between symbolic ideology and operational ideology. Third, we consider the validity and reliability of the various measures. Finally, we revisit our choice of statistical methods. Although we certainly do not conclude that Berry et al.‘s measure lacks clear utility or relevance, we believe it may serve a more limited purpose than the authors intended. We urge researchers to consider the conceptual, methodological, and epistemological concerns raised in our response before using any indicator of state public opinion.

Should there be Separate Justice Systems for Special Needs Populations? Results from the Penn State Public Opinion Poll

Changing population demographics and the aging of the baby boom generation will affect the structure of all the institutions of our society. An aging and increasingly disabled correctional population will force changes in the way the criminal justice system operates. The application of the Americans with Disabilities Act to prisons is controversial and may place extreme burdens on an already overburdened criminal justice system. An alternative is the establishment of a separate system for special needs offenders (the physically and mentally disabled and the elderly), much as a separate system was established for juveniles more than a century ago. This article examines public support for the idea of a separate justice system for each of these special needs populations, using data from the 2001 Penn State Poll. Results suggest support for a separate system for the mentally disabled, less support for the physically disabled, and little support for a system for the elderly.

"Islamic Yuppies"? State Rescaling, Citizenship, and Public Opinion Formation in Tehran, Iran

The contemporary political map of Tehran, Iran, is marked by a central state conflict between the institutionalized theocratic system and a newly emerging liberal-democratic system. While this conflict has received worldwide media attention, the underlying processes of state rescaling and their effects on the formation of citizenship have not. Using the concept of state rescaling, I argue that the Iranian state is increasingly, though contentiously, constituted at transnational and local levels; this occurs through matters such as the debates over opening political, economic, and cultural borders, and the decentralization of political processes through local town and city council elections. The city of Tehran plays a crucial role as the seat of national government, an increasingly autonomous local state onto its own, and Iran's window on transnational processes. I seek to explore the kinds of political identities that can be created under such turbulent processes of Iranian neo-liberal democratization and state rescaling. While conjectural at this point, it is possible to examine particular social constructions of new forms of Iranian citizenship to address how state transformations will potentially change citizenship into the future. In particular, I examine the social construction of "the Islamic yuppie" and public opinion polls as arguments advocating a new kind of an urban, cosmopolitan citizen who can move fluidly through multiple spaces and scales. These constructions, contextualized within current processes of Iranian state restructuring and rescaling, underscore the need to think through citizenship in general, and Iranian citizenship in particular, as a multiscalar process.

Propagating Terror: 9/11 and the Mediation of War

Academic and public analysis of the media's performance during the 9/11 and Afghanistan wars are critically influenced by the specific ideological perspective of the analyst. Those commentators who support the reprisal attacks against bin Laden, Al Qaeda and the Taliban tend to commend the media, identifying a substantial confluence between state interests, public opinion and media reporting. Alternatively, commentators such as Noam Chomsky who are highly critical of American foreign policy, especially in the Middle East, see the media as representing a pernicious conduit which allows state and military hegemonies to oppress and manipulate public opinion. The role of the media in reporting war and terrorism needs to be considered in terms of processes of cultural construction and representation. As we approach the anniversary of 9/11 and the ‘war on terror’, we need to understand that government foreign policy, public opinion and military action are all shaped through specific kinds of mediated discourse. Our role as media analysts is to expose these discourses in terms of those complex historical and cultural conditions which have served to generate a violence of this proportion.

Jewish Fundamentalism in Israel

In their book Jewish Fundamentalism in Israel, Shahak and Mezvinsky document the nature of Jewish fundamentalism and argue that it is a grow­ing threat to Israeli society. As a work of activist scholarship, the authors point out that their aim is not to present new scholarship but to document, in English, literature that is normally available only in Hebrew, and to make the links between Jewish fundamentalism and Israeli politics clearer. As such, this is a fascinating, informative, and easy-to-read book for anyone interested in Israeli politics, Judaism, and its relation to Israeli poli­cies toward Palestine. It presents facets of Orthodox Judaism (particularly messianic, which they consider most dangerous) and Israeli politics not usually available to those without access to Hebrew sow·ces. Shahak and Mezvinsky show that Judaism, like any other religion or ideology, has its extremists and fundamentalists and that these views have very real effects on state politics and public opinion. In fact, they take a stance few are willing to risk: describing Israeli intolerance of non-Jews as Jewish Nazism. Each chapter discus9es in meticulous- at times, excessive- detail the history and characteristics of particular religious groups and parties in Israel. The authors quote throughout from a diverse range of sources, from religious texts and rabbinical writings to news articles in such Israeli dailies as Ha'aretz. In the preface, the authors lay out the book's context: "We have written this book in order to reveal the essential character of Jewish fundamentalism and its adherents. This character threatens democratic features of Israeli soci­ety." They add, furthermore: "We believe that a critique of Jewish funda­mentalism, which entails a critique of the Jewish past, can help Jews acquire more understanding and improve their behavior toward Palestinians." At this point, their aim is linked primarily to prospects for peace in the Middle East, though by the end of the book their concern seems more focused on Israel itself. At the end of chapter 7, they state: ...

Terror in Cyberspace

There is an inverse relationship between public access to the Internet and the inability of governments and institutions to control information flow and hence state allegiance, ideology, public opinion, and policy formulation. Increase in public access to the Internet results in an equivalent decrease in government and institutional power. Indeed, after September 11, 2001, Internet traffic statistics show that many millions of Americans have connected to alternative news sources outside the continental United States. The information they consume can be and often is contrary to U.S. government statements and U.S. mainstream media reporting. Recognizing this, terrorists will coordinate their assaults with an adroit use of cyberspace for the purpose of manipulating perceptions, opinion, and the political and socioeconomic direction of many nation-states.

Turkey in the EU's Enlargement Process: Obstacles and Challenges

The European Union (EU) has embarked on an ambitious programme of enlargement. In this process, Turkey, as one of the candidates, has a particularly difficult position. This article argues that Turkey's relationship with the Union should not be treated as bilateral, but rather should be placed in the larger framework of EU enlargement. In this context, the main proposition is that Turkey's EU candidacy and its negotiations for accession are affected by four factors: the Copenhagen criteria, the EU's institutional set-up, member state preferences (and related to that, Turkey's population) and public opinion within the EU. The article analyses the interplay between these factors and discusses Turkey's future with the European Union in a multilateral perspective.