Abstract
This chapter designs the research. To test theories, empirical measures and data are required. The chapter sets out hypotheses which will be tested and provides the technical details upon which the empirical testing is based. The first section introduces four measures of support and uses data reduction techniques to analyse if they constitute separate or related items. This provides crucial insights into how Germans think about democracy, by evaluating how far the theoretical distinctions correspond to the empirical reality. The second section summarises the theoretical approaches, highlights their principal variables and draws hypotheses with which they are tested. In addition, the chapter introduces the data source used: Allgemeine Bevölkerungs Umfrage der Sozialwissenschaften, German General Social Survey (ALLBUS).
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Notes
- 1.
There are a wide variety of conceptual frameworks drawing on different empirical measures. See, for example, Pippa Norris, Critical Citizens: Global Support for Democratic Governance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). Dieter Fuchs, ‘The Political Culture Paradigm’, in Russell J. Dalton and Hans-Dieter Klingemann (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Political Behavior (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 167.
- 2.
Issues surrounding methodology have been recurring themes in the academic literature on popular support. The finest examples, however, are the Miller-Citrin debate in the 1974 edition of the American Political Science Review, the debate between Anderson and Canache et al. on the meaning and inference of satisfaction with democracy indicator—see Chap. 4. These intersect with classic and contemporary debates about public reasoning about politics. Classic discussions are found in Walter Lippmann, Public Opinion (Macmillan Press: New York, 1922). See also Robert E. Lane and David O. Sears, Public Opinion (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1964). For contemporary discussions, see, for example, Arthur Lupia and Mathew D. McCubbins, The Democratic Dilemma: Can Citizens Learn What they Need to Know? (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1998).
- 3.
The literature on this is too voluminous to cite extensively, but the following provides a detailed account of the key debates. See, for example, Philip E. Converse, P.E. (1962) ‘Information Flow and the Stability of Partisan Attitudes’. Public Opinion Quarterly 26 (1962), pp. 578–599. Philip E. Converse, ‘The Nature of Mass Belief Systems’ in David Apter (ed.) Ideology and Discontent. (Free Press: New York 1964).
- 4.
Gordon Smith, ‘The Nature of the Unified State’ in Gordon Smith, William E. Paterson, Peter H. Merkl and Stephen Padgett (eds.) Developments in German Politics (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1992), pp. 37–51.
- 5.
Peter Merkl, ‘A New German Identity’ in in Gordon Smith, William E. Paterson, Peter H. Merkl and Stephen Padgett (eds.) Developments in German Politics (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1992), pp. 327–348.
- 6.
See, for example, Hans-Dieter Klingemann, Mapping Political Support in the 1990s in Pippa Norris (ed.) Critical Citizens: Global Support for Democratic Governance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 40.
- 7.
William Mishler and Richard Rose, ‘Trust in Untrustworthy Institutions: Culture and Institutional Performance in Post-Communist Societies’ Studies in Public Policy no 310 (Glasgow: University of Strathclyde, Centre for the Study of Public Policy, 1998).
- 8.
Russell J. Dalton, Citizen Politics: Public Opinion and Political Participation in Advanced Industrial Democracies: Third Edition (New York, NY: Chatham House Publishers, 2002), pp. 240–241.
- 9.
Robert Rohrschneider and Rudiger Schmitt-Beck, ‘Trust in Democratic Institutions: Theory and Evidence Ten Years after Unification’. German Politics, 11/3 (2002), pp. 37–38.
- 10.
Andrew Moravcsik, (2004), ‘Is there a “Democratic Deficit” in World Politics? A Framework for Analysis’, Government and Opposition, 39, 2:336–363.
- 11.
Marcus Höreth, ‘The Trilemma of Legitimacy Multilevel Governance in the EU and the Problem of Democracy’, Center for European Integration Studies, (1998), p. 4.
- 12.
Alan C. Acock, Discovering Structural Equation Modeling Using Stata: Revised Edition (College Station, TX: Stata Press, 2013).
- 13.
Ronald Inglehart, ‘Postmodernization Erodes Respect for Authority, but Increases Support for Democracy’, in Pippa Norris (ed.) Critical Citizens: Global Support for Democratic Governance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 242.
- 14.
Christian Welzel, ‘Individual Modernity’ in Russell J. Dalton and Hans-Dieter Klingemann (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Political Behavior (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 195.
- 15.
Russell J. Dalton, ‘The Dynamics of Party System Change’, in Karlheinz Reif and Ronald Inglehart Eurobarometer: The Dynamics of European Public Opinion Essays in Honour of Jacques-Rene Rabier (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1991), p. 219.
- 16.
Michael Woolcock, Civil Society and Social Capital in Michael Edwards (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Civil Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), pp. 197–208.
- 17.
Jan W. Van Deth, ‘Norms of Citizenship’ in Russell J. Dalton and Hans-Dieter Klingemann (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Political Behavior (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 403.
- 18.
Oscar W. Gabriel and Jan W. van Deth, ‘Political Interest’ in Jan W. Van Deth and Elinor Scarbrough (eds.) The Impact of Values: Beliefs in Government Volume Four (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 390–411.
- 19.
Martin Kroh and Christian Könnecke, ‘Political Interest and Participation in Germany’ DIW Economy, Politics Science Bulletin Berlin 4/1(2014) (Berlin: Deutsche Institut für Wirtschaftsforschuung).
- 20.
Jan W. van Deth, ‘Measuring Social Capital: Orthodoxies and Continuing Controversies’ International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 6/1 (2003), pp. 79–92.
- 21.
The literature on this is sizeable. See, for example, Kenneth Newton, and Pippa Norris, ‘Confidence in Public Institutions: Faith, Culture, or Performance?’ In Susan Pharr and Robert Putnam (eds.) Disaffected Democracies: What’s Troubling the Trilateral Countries? (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000); Max Kaase, ‘Interpersonal Trust, Political Trust and Non-institutionalised Political Participation in Western Europe’. West European Politics 22/3(1999), pp. 1–23. Ross Campbell, ‘The Sources of Institutional Trust: Civic Culture or Economic Performance?’ German Politics, 13/3 (2004), pp. 401–418.
- 22.
Morris Fiorina, Retrospective Voting in American National Elections (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981), p. 5.
- 23.
I would accept that easternness encompasses a broader range of phenomena, particularly the history and memory of those who spent the majority of their lives in the GDR.
- 24.
See, for example, Edeltraud Roller, ‘Welfare State and Political Culture in Unified Germany’. German Politics, 24/3 (2015), pp. 292–316.
- 25.
The nature and extent of political socialisation in the GDR is sharply contested. Some suggest a specific GDR mentality formed. See, for example, Dieter Geulen, Politische Sozialisation in der DDR: Autobiographische Gruppensgesprache mit Angehorigen der Intelligenz (Opladen: Leske + Budrich, 1998); also, Christiana Lemke, Die Ursachen des Umbruchs 1989: Politische Sozialisation in der Ehemaligen DDR. Darmstadt: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1991). For a more differentiated view, see: Mary Fulbrook, Anatomy of a dictatorship: Inside the GDR, 1949–1989. Oxford: Oxford, University Press, 1995).
- 26.
See, for example, Ross Campbell, ‘Political Culture and the Legacy of Socialism’, German Politics, 24/3 (2015), pp. 271–291.
- 27.
See, for example, Klaus Schroeder, Der Preis der Einheit. Eine Bilanz (Munich: Carl Hanser Verlag, 2000), p. 146. See also, David P. Conradt, ‘The Civic Culture and Unified Germany: An Overview’ German Politics, 24/3 (2015), pp. 256–257.
- 28.
James Jaccard and Robert Turrisi, Interaction Effects in Multiple Regression: Second Edition (London: Sage, 2003).
- 29.
Satisfaction with democracy (Chap. 4) is scaled 0–5 and is treated as quasi-continuous; trust in democratic institutions (Chap. 6) uses a combined index which sums the scores of respondents’ answers to the four institutions. As each institution is scaled 0–6, the overall scale is thus 0–24. Chapter 7, meanwhile, focuses on trust in European institutions, combining the scores for the parliament and commission to give a 0–12 scale.
- 30.
For the avoidance of doubt I use the R package. See, cran.r-project.org/mirrors.html.
- 31.
Larry D. Schroeder, David L. Sjoquist and Paula E. Stephan, Understanding Regression Analysis: An Introductory Guide (London: Sage, 1986).
- 32.
See, Ulrike Grömping, ‘Relative Importance for Linear Regression in R: The Package relaimpo’, Journal of Statistical Software, 17/1 (2006), pp. 1–27.
- 33.
R has a variety of ways of calculating these. For the avoidance of doubt, I use average marginal effects (AME) calculated using the effects package. See, John Fox and Sanford Weisberg, An R Companion to Applied Regression: 2nd Edition. (London: Sage, 2011). These effects are illustrated using the ggplot2 package—see, Hadley Wickham, ggplot2: Elegant graphics for data analysis: 2nd edition (Warsaw: Springer, 2016).
- 34.
See Fred C. Pampel, Logistic Regression: A Primer (London: Sage, 2000).
- 35.
For further details, see Scott Menard, Applied Logistic Regression Analysis: Second Edition. (London: Sage, 2002).
- 36.
See, for example, Corina Mood, ‘Logistic Regression: Why We Cannot do What We Think We Can Do, and What We Can do About it. European Sociological Review, 26/1(2010), pp. 67–82.
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Campbell, R. (2019). Designing the Research: From Concept to Measures and Methods. In: Popular Support for Democracy in Unified Germany. New Perspectives in German Political Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03792-5_3
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