Political Culture: Theory, Description or Mistake?

Seminararbeit , 2005 , 7 Seiten , Note: 2,0

Politik - Sonstige Themen

There are three theoretical schools within the field of comparative politics: the rational choice theories, the culturalist approaches as well as the structural analyses. This paper addresses the culturalist approach within comparative politics. To begin with the paper offers different definitions of ‘culture’, then shows how change in political culture can be measured and presents two different techniques for measuring values. The theory of political culture has many inquiries: among others it tries to explain electoral turnout, change in political behavior, and economic growth.

1. Introduction

There are three theoretical schools within the field of comparative politics:

the rational choice theories, the culturalist approaches as well as the structural analyses. This paper addresses the culturalist approach within comparative politics. To begin with the paper offers different definitions of ‘culture’, then shows how change in political culture can be measured and presents two different techniques for measuring values.

The theory of political culture has many inquiries: among others it tries to explain electoral turnout, change in political behavior, and economic growth.

2. What is ‘Culture’, can it change, and how to measure it.

What is culture? Culture is a system of meaning that people use to manage their daily worlds, large and small. It is the basis of social and political identity that affects how people line up and how they act on a wide range of matters. It is also a framework for organizing the world, for locating the self and others in it, for interpreting the motives of others. (Lichbach/Zuckerman 1997: 42) Inglehart refers to culture as a system of common basic values that help shape the behavior of the people in a given society. (Inglehart 1997: 217)

According to Lane a fundamental failure is that Political Science has not come up yet with an operational definition of the internal structure of political culture, respectively of the variables of which it is composed. (Lane 1992:363)

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• Hochschule: Southern Connecticut State University (Department of Political Science)
• Veranstaltung: Proseminar: Comparative Politics
• Note: 2,0
• Autor: Claudia Baczewski (Autor:in)
• Erscheinungsjahr: 2005
• Seiten: 7
• Katalognummer: V63376
• ISBN (eBook): 9783638564403
• ISBN (Buch): 9783656777274
• Sprache: Englisch
• Schlagworte: Political, Culture, Theory, Description, Mistake, Proseminar, Comparative, Politics