Community Psychology, Political Efficacy, and Trust

Much attention has been paid to the effects of political efficacy and trust on political participation. Most studies tend to use efficacy or trust as an independent variable to explain political actions such as voting, campaign involvement, and the like. Despite their importance in explanations of political behavior, relatively little is known regarding mechanisms through which social involvement may influence trust and efficacy. If efficacy and trust are of value, then it is important that we determine how their development can be fostered, and especially whether their development can be promoted through social interaction—such as a sense of community. Borrowing from the field of community psychology, I employ the Sense of Community Index to provide a more nuanced measure of community based on individual perceptions of their community that previous studies were unable to capture. Analyzing original survey data, this paper examines to what extent, if any, a sense of community matters for trust and efficacy. The results demonstrate that social forces, such as community, exert positive and significant effects on internal and external efficacy and personal and political trust, independently of individual traits such as income, age, gender, and education.     

Democracy Without Participation: A New Politics for a Disengaged Era

Changing patterns of political participation observed by political scientists over the past half-century undermine traditional democratic theory and practice. The vast majority of democratic theory, and deliberative democratic theory in particular, either implicitly or explicitly assumes the need for widespread citizen participation. It requires that all citizens possess the opportunity to participate and also that they take up this opportunity. But empirical evidence gathered over the past half-century strongly suggests that many citizens do not have a meaningful opportunity to participate in the ways that many democratic theorists require, and do not participate in anything like the numbers that they believe is necessary. This paper outlines some of the profound changes that have been experienced by liberal democratic states in the 20th and early 21st Centuries, changes which are still ongoing, and which have resulted in declines in citizens participation and trust, the marginalisation of citizens from democratic life, and the entrenchment of social and economic inequalities which have damaged democracy. The paper challenges the conventional wisdom in rejecting the idea that the future of democracy lies in encouraging more widespread participation. The paper takes seriously the failure of the strategies adopted by many states to increase participation, especially among the poor, and suggests that instead of requiring more of citizens, we should in fact be requiring less of them. Instead of seeking to encourage more citizen participation, we should acknowledge that citizens will probably not participate in the volume, or in the ways, many democratic theorists would like, and that therefore we need an alternative approach: a regime which can continue to produce democratic outcomes, and which satisfies the requirements of political equality, in the absence of widespread participation by citizens.     

Making Attentive Citizens: The Ethics of Democratic Engagement,Political Equality,and Social Justice

Much discussion of the ethics of participation focuses on electoral participation and whether citizens are obligated or can be coerced to vote. Yet these debates have ignored that citizens must first pay attention to politics and make up their minds about where they stand before they can engage in any form of participation. This article considers the importance for liberal democracy of citizens paying attention to politics, or attentive citizenship. It argues that the democratic state has an obligation to cultivate interest in politics and that this obligation authorizes means up to and including some forms of coercion. The argument is that when citizens are inattentive to politics, it undermines political equality and social justice because it undermines what John Rawls called the fair value of the political liberties. The importance of these ends for liberal democratic states requires them to take steps to promote attentive citizenship.     

Developing civic engagement in university education: predicting current and future engagement in community services

One of the important goals of education is for students to learn to be responsible civic participants. Thus, the time students spend in college is invaluable. It is important that students learn to participate and be responsible citizens of their community during their time in college (Giles and Eyler in Mich J Community Serv Learn 1:77–85, 1994). In this study, a program to help achieve this important educational goal is presented and evaluated. This involved the examination of the impact of actual participation in a community service activity on students’ changes in attitudes and future intentions. A path model based on predictions drawn from place attachment theory was developed and tested to examine how participating in a community service activity affected students’ place attachment and interests in community service. Two-hundred-and-nine university students participated in the study. Results confirmed the hypothesized model. Implications for enhancing student involvement in their communities and encouraging their development into responsible citizens were discussed.     

Beyond Skills and Structure: Justice Dispositions as Antecedents of Young Citizens' Volunteering and Political Participation

Community involvement is usually attributed to opportunity structures and individuals' ability to be involved. Building on psychological justice research, this paper proposes that justice dispositions add to explaining why young citizens become active in their communities or not. Furthermore, it is argued that justice dispositions help to understand why most studies find only moderate relationships between youth volunteering and forms of political involvement. In a sample of 321 young Swiss volunteers, this study shows justice centrality and belief in a just world to predict the extent of volunteering and political participation, even after controlling for civic skills and opportunity structures. However, scrutinising the motivations to volunteer, self‐oriented motivations (enhancement, social, career and understanding) more strongly affected the level of volunteering than motivations related to justice dispositions (political responsibility and social responsibility). These findings have implications for the attraction and retention of volunteers as well as for the politics of volunteering and community development in general. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Unravelling the dynamics and trends of social capital: Case of South Korea

Analyzing the World Values Surveys, the present study reveals how Korean people trust their fellow citizens and participate in associations in the process of democratization. It has been argued that trust and participation in voluntary associations go hand in hand. Although results revealed a remarkable growth of participation in voluntary associations since democratization, the level of trust has not increased. Instead, it declined sharply during the same period. A further analysis found no obvious connection between levels of civic activism and interpersonal trust, as suggested in the theoretical literature. Contrary to what has been argued in the literature, face-to-face interactions within voluntary associations have not occasioned these civic activists in Korea to greater trust in one another.     

Religion,Political Discourse,and Activism Among Varying Racial/Ethnic Groups in America

The current study assesses the roles that political encouragement from clergy and lay involvement in political discussions play in the political and civic activism of varying racial/ethnic groups. Congregants are likely to participate in varying forms of activism when asked by clergy because of the high levels of trust that Americans have in their clergy and because political appeals are often communicated in a culturally relevant manner. In addition, participation in political discussions within houses of worship is likely to increase a sense of political agency and efficacy. For almost all groups, lay political deliberation is associated with activism. However, while political encouragement from clergy is associated with Black and Hispanic activism, it plays a negligible role in motivating Whites and Caribbean Blacks to action. Ideological symmetry between clergy and congregants may explain the degree to which political appeals from clergy motivate varying racial/ethnic groups to action.     

Analysis of the Mediating Effect of Personal-Psychological Variables on the Relationship Between Socioeconomic Status and Political Participation: A Structural Equations Framework

The goal of this research was to test whether the relationship between socioeconomic status and political participation is direct or mediated by personal variables such as self-esteem, locus of control, and political efficacy, and to detect how such a mediating process might operate if it exists. Two forms of participation, namely active political participation and the more passive psychological involvement of citizens in the democratic process, were treated as separate but related facets of participation. Four competing models were advanced and tested. The data were collected from 434 citizens in the north of Israel who were interviewed by questionnaire. The analysis was performed by structural equations modeling with LISREL VIII. The findings show that the relationship between socioeconomic status and political participation can be better understood as being mediated by personal variables rather than direct. This is demonstrated by the many nonsignificant paths in the direct model. The findings also reveal that active political participation and psychological involvement are distinct but related constructs, where involvement leads to active participation. In addition, all research variables were related more strongly to psychological involvement than to active political participation. The findings are discussed in terms of their implications for future research on political participation.     

Student Experiences of the Adolescent Diversion Project: A Community-Based Exemplar in the Pedagogy of Service-Learning

Service-learning partnerships between universities and surrounding communities striving to create systems-level change must consider an emphasis in critical community service; a community centered paradigm where students are taught to work with communities to better understand contexts surrounding a social problem, as opposed to merely volunteering to provide a service to a community. The Adolescent Diversion Project (ADP), which has been operating for over 30 years, demonstrates critical community service through the type of relationship built between students and the local community. This article describes: a qualitative study with ADP students, the historical context of ADP, what and how students learned through their involvement in ADP, and reframes the work of this project as a form of service-learning pedagogy. Inductive content analysis was employed to identify underlying themes across participants related to their personal experiences of ADP and its impact in their lives. Findings were compared with service-learning outcomes and other quantitative studies conducted with past ADP cohorts from the literature. Consistent with past studies, ADP students become more negative toward social systems involved with their youth. This finding may explain an increase in feelings of political commitment following involvement in ADP. Consistent with service-learning outcomes, results demonstrate that ADP should be further documented as not only an effective community-based program but also as an exemplar in the pedagogy of service-learning. This study highlights why service-learning opportunities for students are not just one way to teach students, they are opportunities to bridge relationships within communities, bring life to theoretical concepts, and build the foundations necessary for educated citizens that will one day take lead roles in our society.     

Beyond the Frontstage: Trust, Access, and the Relational Context in Research with Refugee Communities

This paper examines the role of trust and the concept of access as they affect the relational context in which community research, and research with refugee communities in particular, is conducted. Sociologist Irving Goffman's metaphor of frontstage and backstage behavior is used to illustrate the complexity and importance of developing of relations of trust, and thereby gaining "backstage" access, in communities that are generally closed to outsiders. It is argued that gaining authentic ("backstage") access to refugee communities, as well as other communities that have developed a self-protective insularity, is essential if we are to gather data that accurately reflect the actual beliefs, feelings, and experiences of community members. The paper then examines the puzzling lack of discussion regarding issues of trust, access, and the relational context in the literature on refugee mental health. Explanations for this apparent inattention are sought in the influence of the prevailing scientific paradigm that guides most research with refugees, and that shapes the values of the field's "gatekeepers," the editors and reviewers of scholarly journals. Throughout the paper, key points are illustrated with examples drawn from the author's research with refugees from Guatemala, Bosnia, and Afghanistan.     

In-Group and Out-Group Networks,Informal Social Activities,and Electoral Participation Among Immigrants in South Korea

With increasing global migration, immigrant incorporation and assimilation have become a growing concern. Prior research has mostly focused on economic adaptation of immigrants in North American and European context. This study shifts the focus to political incorporation of foreign-born spouses and other naturalized citizens living in South Korea, a topic that has received very little attention. Its primary goal is to examine the relationship between bridging and bonding social capital, measured in terms of interpersonal networks and informal social activities, and formal political participation, i.e., voting. Data come from the National Survey of Multicultural Families (2012), the largest and most up-to-date government-funded research project on Korea’s burgeoning immigrant population. Using multilevel analysis, this study shows that ties to inter-ethnic contacts (native Koreans) and greater involvement in informal social life are associated with higher odds of voting among immigrants. Greater embeddedness in in-group or co-ethnic networks, on the other hand, is associated with lower odds of voting participation. Moreover, net of individual-level network and background factors, living in a community with a higher level of social activities, is related to greater electoral participation.     

Participatory practices and political knowledge: how motivational inequality moderates the effects of formal participation on knowledge

Democracies rely upon politically knowledgeable citizens for their legitimacy and to sustain themselves. In Australia, policy initiatives have addressed concerns about the low levels of political knowledge among young people. Yet research about how young Australians acquire political knowledge, beyond schools, is scarce. The present study referring to the concepts of situated learning, self-determination and knowledge gap, asks whether young adult’s participatory practices (e.g., participation in politics, prior involvement in decision-making at school) predict political knowledge. Analyses that control for multiple predictors of political knowledge suggest differential associations between political knowledge and different participatory practices. Motivational inequality, as defined by interest in politics, moderates the associations with party-political participation and participation at school; the conditional effect of party-related political participation is further moderated by educational resources. Gendered differences are identified for some participatory practices. Directions for future research and the importance of participatory experiences and how to establish a foundation of young citizens’ political knowledge are discussed.

     

Sense of Community, Neighboring, and Social Capital as Predictors of Local Political Participation in China

This study examines the state of sense of community, neighboring behavior, and social capital in the People’s Republic of China, and explores their ability to predict local political participation, in the form of voting in elections for Urban Resident/Rural Villager Committees. Using a nationally representative survey, rural, older and married residents and those with a primary or high school education and higher perceived socio-economic status are more likely to participate. In rural areas, men are more likely than women to vote. For urban residents, knowing one’s neighbors is more important whereas in rural areas, neighboring behavior is more important, but both predict voting. Social capital does not generally predict Chinese people’s local political participation. Western definitions of social capital derived from theories about networking, bonding and bridging ties may be too culturally individualistic for China, whose collectivist society and agrarian kinship networks predate Communism. Simply knowing and helping one’s neighbors, rather than more abstract notions of trust, reciprocity or membership, may lead to the development of local democracy.     

Freedom, Equality, Minarets

This paper discusses the Swiss minaret ban as a threat to equal citizenship rather than a threat to freedom of religion. The main argument of the paper is that cultural differences can threaten the fair value of equal political participation rights as well as socio-economic ones. These differences are morally troubling despite legitimate emphasis on the need for a shared (political) culture. To ensure that the state treats its citizens as equals with regard to cultural differences requires a form of liberal neutrality which consists of two elements. Equal citizenship requires, first, justificatory neutrality in deciding which matters are legitimate concerns for legislation. It requires also—as a second safeguard—institutional arrangements which ensure that in the process of implementing justificatory neutral decisions the interests of all affected citizens receive a fair hearing. This means that the factors which tend to undermine the equal standing of citizens in society should be counteracted.     

Bringing the European Union closer to its young citizens: Youth active citizenship in Europe and trust in EU institutions

Abstract

European Union countries are participatory and representative democracies. Therefore, active citizenship in the EU and trust in EU institutions are paramount for the continuation and the strengthening of the EU project. Young Europeans who hold the future in their hands need to be actively engaged not only in the social and political life within their national communities, but also in the wider European community. The papers in this special issue examine whether and how European youth identify with the EU, trust EU institutions and engage in EU issues, and which societal and proximal-level contexts and/or individual-level attributes promote or hinder young people’s active citizenship in European context. They are based on results from the Horizon 2020 CATCH-EyoU project, standing for Constructing AcTive CitizensHip with European Youth: Policies, Practices, Challenges and Solutions. Scientists represent different disciplines (Psychology, Political Science, Sociology, Media and Communications, Education) and from eight European countries (Sweden, Estonia, U.K., Germany, Czech Republic, Greece, Portugal, Italy). Together, the papers contribute to the development of a new, cutting-edge conceptualization of youth active citizenship in the EU, and to a better understanding of the factors promoting or inhibiting young EU citizens’ engagement, participation and active citizenship at the European level.     

Parental Involvement and Public Schools: Disappearing Mothers in Labor and Politics

In this article, I argue that the material and rhetorical connection between “parental involvement” and motherhood has the effect of making two important features of parental involvement disappear. Both of these features need to be taken into account to think through the positive and negative effects of parental involvement in public schooling. First, parental involvement is labor. In the following section of this paper, I discuss the work of feminist scholars who have brought this to light. Second, parental involvement remains one of the most significant ways in which citizens participate in the public sphere. While education reform projects centered on parental involvement do show some recognition that what parents/mothers do is in fact work, even as they ignore the gendered dimensions of this work and sunnily demand that parents do ever more of it, these projects resist the recognition that parents’/mothers’ involvement is also political.     

Changing patterns of political participation of citizens of immigrant origin in the Brussels capital region: The October 2000 elections

The October 2000 elections did constitute a landmark for the political participation of immigrant origin citizens in the Brussels Capital Region. There was a remarkable increase of elected Belgian politicians of non-EU–mainly Moroccan–origin. In this contribution we want to discuss the changing patterns of political participation of immigrant origin citizens in the Brussels Capital Region as seen in the most recent local elections. We contextualize the electoral success of Turkish and (mainly) Moroccan politicians and the poor involvement of EU citizens in the recent elections. To this purpose, we also discuss the political situation in the bilingual region of Brussels, Belgian citizenship law and regulations for political participation of foreign residents.     

A double-edged sword: How social diversity affects trust in representatives via perceived competence and warmth

Previous research has claimed that diversity erodes trust, even though the empirical evidence is mixed and restricted to ethnic neighborhood diversity. Against the backdrop of increasing diversity within the political sphere and concurrently declining political trust, we examined the impact of social diversity on trust in groups of political representatives. In two experiments (N₁ = 109, N₂ = 248) we tested how the diversity of political parties affected citizens’ trust in them. In line with predictions of the stereotype content model, diverse parties were perceived as warmer and less competent than non-diverse parties (Experiments 1–2). Additionally, party diversity was perceived as having more benefits, but also involving more threats (Experiment 2). Consequently, diversity had both positive (via warmth and benefits) and negative (via competence and threats) indirect effects on trust. These results help to untangle previously mixed, for the most part non-experimental, findings of the relationship between diversity and trust.     

Public Policy, Participation and the Third Position: The Implication of Engaging Communities on their Own Terms

Policy development and implementation should be fundamental for community psychologists in their endeavors to create social change. Policy necessarily is engaged at broad social and political levels, but it is mediated through communities and individuals, and thus appealing for our discipline. We argue that there are increasing opportunities for social input in liberal democracies with the growing awareness of the need to consider social factors in policy. Public participation is one aspect of policy development, but it can be problematic and can disempowered communities, especially disadvantaged communities. Using the framework of the ‘third position’, a case study of attempts to ameliorate institutional oppression of Australian Aboriginal people through policy change is described. Structural reform to community engagement is described in terms of empowerment and capacity building. Power relationships are deconstructed to allow understandings of the dynamics of policy change, and the broader implications for community psychological praxis are discussed.     

Agency and social adaptation

This review examines the relevance of agency to the citizen's participation in modern society. Recently, a number of authors have proposed that the development of a more communal rather than individualistic-oriented person would remedy the social alienation found in modern society. In this paper I propose that in modern, complex, and technology-oriented societies, agency, or an instrumental orientation, is necessary for citizens to be able to adapt to their cultural environment. Findings from research in peace, community, and organizational psychology are reviewed in terms of the relevance of agency to social action and community participation. Components of agency, such as self-protection concerns, efficacy beliefs, and moral responsibility values, were found to facilitate social action in modern Western societies. Social action, in turn, enables citizens to acquire rights and resources that allow their participation in work and the community. Accordingly, agency as well as communion, are necessary for citizens to establish the requirements for participation in modern and technologically-advanced societies. Implications for social intervention and policy are indicated.