How different are cultural and economic ideology?

While a single left-right dimension is often used for elites, many scholars have found it useful to distinguish mass political ideology along two dimensions: an ‘economic’ dimension concerning issues of redistribution, regulation, and social insurance, and a ‘cultural’ (or ‘social’) dimension concerning issues of national boundaries and traditional morality. While economic and cultural ideology do not reduce to a single left-right dimension, they are often moderately — and sometimes strongly — correlated. These correlations vary in magnitude and direction across individuals and countries. The association of these dimensions is due, in part, to shared antecedents in psychological needs for security and certainty. However, these needs explain more variance in cultural than economic ideology, and their relationship with the latter varies across individuals and countries. Traits related to empathy, compassion, and agreeableness are an additional source of variation in mass ideology and are especially important to orientations toward inequality and thus to economic ideology.

Duke Scholars

Author Christopher Johnston Political Science

Author Trent Ollerenshaw