Understanding and challenging populist negativity towards politics: the perspectives of British citizens
Understanding and challenging populist negativity towards politics: the perspectives of British citizens
This article adapts and develops the idea of a cynical or ‘stealth’ understanding of politics to explore how citizens’ estrangement from formal politics is processed cognitively through a populist lens. Earlier work has shown the widespread presence of stealth attitudes in the United States and Finland. We show that stealth attitudes are also well established in Britain, demonstrate their populist character and reveal that age, newspaper readership and concerns about governing practices help predict their adoption by individuals. Yet our survey findings also reveal a larger body of positive attitudes towards the practice of democracy suggesting that there is scope for challenging populist cynicism. We explore these so-called ‘sunshine’ attitudes and connect them to the reform options favoured by British citizens. If we are to challenge populist negativity towards politics, we conclude that improving the operation of representative politics is more important than offering citizens new forms of more deliberative participation.
populism, democracy, citizens
4-23
Stoker, Gerry
209ba619-6a65-4bc1-9235-cba0d826bfd9
Hay, Colin
1dc2c1eb-c9bc-4f6a-ad7a-aa0038689217
1 March 2017
Stoker, Gerry
209ba619-6a65-4bc1-9235-cba0d826bfd9
Hay, Colin
1dc2c1eb-c9bc-4f6a-ad7a-aa0038689217
Stoker, Gerry and Hay, Colin
(2017)
Understanding and challenging populist negativity towards politics: the perspectives of British citizens.
Political Studies, 65 (1), .
(doi:10.1177/0032321715607511).
Abstract
This article adapts and develops the idea of a cynical or ‘stealth’ understanding of politics to explore how citizens’ estrangement from formal politics is processed cognitively through a populist lens. Earlier work has shown the widespread presence of stealth attitudes in the United States and Finland. We show that stealth attitudes are also well established in Britain, demonstrate their populist character and reveal that age, newspaper readership and concerns about governing practices help predict their adoption by individuals. Yet our survey findings also reveal a larger body of positive attitudes towards the practice of democracy suggesting that there is scope for challenging populist cynicism. We explore these so-called ‘sunshine’ attitudes and connect them to the reform options favoured by British citizens. If we are to challenge populist negativity towards politics, we conclude that improving the operation of representative politics is more important than offering citizens new forms of more deliberative participation.
Text
Political Studies Manuscript.pdf
- Accepted Manuscript
More information
Accepted/In Press date: 5 August 2015
e-pub ahead of print date: 22 February 2016
Published date: 1 March 2017
Keywords:
populism, democracy, citizens
Organisations:
Faculty of Social, Human and Mathematical Sciences
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 390467
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/390467
ISSN: 0032-3217
PURE UUID: c860f266-f610-4fce-83ad-612524a3741c
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Date deposited: 04 Apr 2016 10:15
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 05:27
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Author:
Colin Hay
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