Political Participation

12 Key excerpts on "Political Participation"

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  Political Participation in a Changing World

  Conceptual and Empirical Challenges in the Study of Citizen Engagement

  • Yannis Theocharis, Jan W. van Deth(Authors)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Taylor & Francis

    (Publisher)

  (Verba, Schlozman, and Brady 1995) any dimensions of activity that are either designed directly to influ-ence government agencies and the policy process, or indirectly to impact civil society, or which attempt to alter systematic patterns of social behavior. (Norris 2001, 16) all forms of involvement in which citizens express their political opinion and/or convey that opinion to political decision-makers. (Vissers and Stolle 2014, 937) Although they emphasize distinct aspects differently, a common under-standing of, at least, a fundamental idea of what constitutes politi-cal participation is evident from these quotations (van Deth 2014; van Deth 2001). First, Political Participation refers to people in their role as citizens and not, say, as politicians or civil servants. Second, with the exception of the definition by Conway which also allows for “passive” participation (a topic which many scholars—including ourselves—take issue with), Political Participation is understood as an activity (“action”)—simply watching television or claiming to be curi-ous about politics does not constitute Political Participation. Nor does showing an interest in politics by reading the news, or talking about it with friends or family qualify as participation, as Parry, Moyser, and Day (1992, 16) have pointed out. Third, the activities of citizens we define as Political Participation should be voluntary and not ordered by a ruling class or obliged under some law or decree. Finally, politi-cal participation concerns government and politics in a broad sense Expansions of Concepts and Definitions 47 of these words (“political system”) and is neither restricted to specific phases (such as parliamentary decision-making, or the input side of the political system), nor to specific levels or areas (such as national elections or contacts with officials).

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  Voice and Equality

  Civic Voluntarism in American Politics

  • Sidney Verba, Kay Lehman Schlozman, Henry E. Brady(Authors)
  • 1995(Publication Date)
  • Harvard University Press

    (Publisher)

  2 Defining Political Participation Political Participation affords citizens in a democracy an opportu-nity to communicate information to government officials about their concerns and preferences and to put pressure on them to respond. Americans who wish to take part politically have an array of options: they may express their views directly by commu-nicating with public officials or indirectly by attempting to influ-ence electoral outcomes; they may give time and effort or contrib-ute dollars; they may work alone or in concert with others; they may be active at the national, state, or local level. Since different forms of political activity are differentially effective in conveying information or exerting pressure, it matters how citizens take part. In this part of the book we lay the groundwork for both an explanation of why people are active politically and an under-standing of what and from whom the government hears by look-ing closely at the nature and scope of participation in America. In this chapter, we explicate somewhat more fully what we mean by voluntary Political Participation and how various kinds of activity fit into the democratic process. In the chapter that follows, we add descriptive detail about the many ways in which citizens take part. In a discussion that encompasses a wide variety of political activi-ties, we go beyond a catalogue of the kinds of political acts to consider other important aspects of the world of participation. We take into account the volume of activity—not only whether or not 37 people take part in various ways, but how much they do. The analysis of volume will allow us to elaborate the extent to which various activities can apply pressure on the government.

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  Human Rights and Civil Liberties

  • Howard Davis(Author)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Willan

    (Publisher)

  13 Political Participation and electoral politics

  DOI: 10.4324/9781843924548-13

  13.1 Political Participation

  The right of people to participate in public affairs is fundamental to a reasonable democracy. For most people it is predominantly through the processes and institutions of representative politics that such participation takes place. Voting in elections for the House of Commons, the European Parliament, for one of the devolved legislative bodies or for a local council is a fundamental, though in many ways, minimal means of participation. For those who are or wish to be politically active, there should also be in a democracy the freedom to be a candidate in elections and, if successful, a member of the representative body to which elected. Similarly the politically active should not be denied, by arbitrary or unreasonable laws, the right, if properly selected, to be a member of the government or a local council or a devolved executive.

  As indicated in Chapter 3 , public life in the United Kingdom is conducted by a large range of organisations of various kinds and of various degrees of independence from central government. Appointment to such bodies is normally within the patronage of a minister or the discretion of a professional body, for example, though they may be supervised by an appointments commission. Few such bodies are in any way directly or even indirectly elected. They may have to consult with the public but are not in any direct way subject to public censure or recall. While fundamental rights to vote and to stand for representative bodies are widely recognised, rights of wider participation are much less clear.

  13.1.1 International law

  International law recognises the value of political activity in an effective, pluralist democracy. Predominantly such activity is protected by fundamental rights of expression and political association and assembly. A wider, rather abstract right to Political Participation is also recognised. Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights establishes rights not only to vote and be elected and to have equal access to public service but also declares that ‘every citizen shall have the right and the opportunity … to take part in the conduct of public affairs, directly or through freely chosen representatives’. A broad conception of public affairs is meant which includes the exercise of legislative, executive and administrative power and includes all aspects of public administration.1 However, it seems that little that is specific is required under the Article. No particular political system is required, there is no attempt to identify the kinds of public body that ought to be elected and, in any case, this part of Article 25 is understood to be ‘programmatic’, merely identifying aspirations,2

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  Power, Politics, and Society

  An Introduction to Political Sociology

  • Betty A Dobratz, Lisa K Waldner, Timothy Buzzell, Betty Dobratz, Lisa Waldner(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  6

  Political Participation

  In this chapter, we look at the various ways in which individuals and groups participate in the processes of governance. We know from decades of research that there is a great deal of variation in the ways and degrees to which individuals participate in political processes. The chapter opens with a discussion of citizenship as a social role of sorts in a system of politics. We have found that there are many acts associated with citizenship as well as acts associated with exclusion from rights, privileges, or expectations associated with citizenship. Many of these role behaviors have been organized into quite useful typologies of Political Participation. The chapter then looks at these types of Political Participation in detail, including current research. This is followed by a discussion of a contemporary debate around what some call the decline of civic engagement in the United States, and the role of what sociologists call “social capital” in this process. Finally, we look at current debates about how to explain Political Participation changing as a result of broad social forces. The rest of the textbook then moves us into detailed chapters that describe voting and electoral processes, the extensive research on political and social movements, and terrorism as political violence.

  Political Participation AS POWER

  Political Participation is important to the field of political sociology because it addresses fundamental characteristics of politics, the state, and organization of power in society. Who participates in the political decision-making of the community? Is this participation even and equal for all members of the nation; is it divided, or concentrated in the hands of a few? Do some participate more than others? What are the boundaries of legitimate participation encouraged or fostered by the institution of politics and its associated structures? Are certain forms of participation considered illegitimate, beyond the role the nation conceptualizes for citizens? These are a few of the many questions that political sociologists address in the study of Political Participation. Much of the work begins with the study of citizenship.

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  Political Participation Capital

  • Jan Ryszard Garlicki, Stanislaw Sulowski(Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Peter Lang Group

    (Publisher)

  Political Participation in Developing Countries (Cambridge, Massachusetts, London: Harvard University Press, 1976)� 8 K� Janda, J�M� Berry, J� Goldman, The Challenge of Democracy (Boston: Cengage Learning, 2014), p� 226� 9 L�W� Milbrath, M�L� Goel, Political Participation. How and Why Do People Get Involved in Politics? (Chicago: Rand McNally College Publishing Company, 1977), p� 2� Political Participation: theoretical perspectives 19 influence the selection of rulers and representatives and/or the making and outcome of public policies�” 10 In the mid-1990s, one of the creators of the term and the concept of studying political culture, Sidney Verba, by means of, in a way, modifying the earlier presented approach, highlighted the fact that, in the contem- porary political systems, Political Participation is not only, or rather not mainly, the authorities’ choice, but the mechanisms of the system, which “afford citizens in a democracy an opportunity to communicate informa- tion to government officials about their concerns and preferences and to put pressure on them to respond�” 11 In fact, all of the definitions of the term Political Participation include at least four basic elements which reflect the nature of participation� First, Political Participation means activity or actions, which individuals undertake� As Jan W� van Deth states in his paper: “simply watching televi- sion or claiming to be curious about politics does not constitute participa- tion�” 12 Although, on the other hand, the citizens’ interest in politics makes an important basis of political activity� However, being interested in politics does not simply translate into Political Participation; rather, it is a form of passive participation� For one may distinguish “real,” active participation from its more passive counterpart: for instance, membership in a political party limited to paying fees (or even without undertaking such an activity)� 13 Second, Political Participation means citizens or, as some authors empha- size, ordinary citizens� At the same time, we may notice that apart from 10 G� Meyer, F� Ryszka, Political Participation and Democracy in Poland and West Germany (Warszawa: Ośrodek Badań Społecznych, 1991), p� 11� 11 S� Verba, K�L� Scholzman, H� Brady, Voice and

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  Young People and Political Participation

  Teen Players

  • Jacqueline Briggs(Author)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  7, women. It is worth stating that the gender dimension became very important to this research about young people. That is to say, at the outset it was appreci- ated that gender was likely to be a factor, but exactly how important was a surprising revelation. Political Participation Political Participation is one of those concepts with which political phi- losophers and political scientists have grappled for centuries. There are degrees of participation and it is sometimes difficult to determine exactly Political Participation 35 what is meant by participation. Paul Whiteley captures the importance of Political Participation as he says it is ‘at the heart of democratic govern- ment and civil society, and without it there can be no effective democracy’ (2012: 34). As Coxall, Robins and Leach say, Political Participation is ‘citi- zen involvement in politics through for example, voting or pressure group and party activity aimed at influencing government and public policy’ (2006: 54). For Ruedin (2007: 3), participation in politics is ‘understood as an individual activity, albeit carried out in a specific context, and whilst interacting with others’. That specific context is identified by Ruedin as being the political institutions, and includes electoral rules and ‘political activity in general’ (2007: 3). In addition, as Booth says, with reference to America, but it does have wider applicability, ‘Political Participation tends to be somewhat concentrated; individuals who perform the most difficult and time-consuming acts also often perform most of the easier ones’ (1979: 38). He goes on to highlight how participation is unevenly distributed with ‘many people taking part at fairly low levels, and far fewer engaging in large numbers of activities’ (1979: 40).

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  Understanding Democratic Politics

  An Introduction

  • Roland Axtmann(Author)
  • 2003(Publication Date)
  • SAGE Publications Ltd

    (Publisher)

  Such views are useful in that they point to the requirement that Political Participation must involve some minimal degree of effec-tiveness and intentionality in contributing to the making of public policy. But beyond that, what precisely is included or excluded as ‘taking part’ is a matter of continued debate. For example, there has been debate around the issue of whether or not political participa-tion must involve some form of action by the individual. Is the expression of political inter-est, or even political discussion among family or friends, an aspect of Political Participation? Is the expression of verbal support for, or rejection of, a government policy Political Participation? Is an expression of readiness, or willingness, to undertake some future action a measure of Political Participation? Is the passive membership of a group whose leaders then seek to influence government sufficient to count? What about action in areas related to, but distinct from, the polit-ical arena, such as in the workplace? And, finally, what about actions that seem to vio-late democratic principles, such as political violence, or that are simply unconventional, like sit-ins? Should they be part of what we take Political Participation to mean? There are no easy answers to such ques-tions and different authors have come to different conclusions. Pateman (1970), for example, has argued for including participa-tion in the making of decisions in other non-governmental arenas. And certainly, as Eckstein (1961) once pointed out, what is learned about participation in those arenas may indeed have an impact upon participa-tion in the political sphere itself. Others, such as Barnes, Kaase and others (1979), recog-nized that political protest had become a sig-nificant part of citizen political activity in advanced industrial democracies in the late 1960s and so brought direct action within the compass of the term.

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  Politics East and West: A Comparison of Japanese and British Political Culture

  A Comparison of Japanese and British Political Culture

  • Curtis H. Martin, Bruce Stronach(Authors)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  In surveys, conventional political behavior is often defined by seven behaviors: reading about politics in the papers, discussing politics with friends, working on community problems, contacting politicians and public officials, convincing friends to vote as one's self, participating in an election campaign, and attending political meetings. But these by no means exhaust the possibilities, and arguably reading about and even discussing politics might better be included under the rubric of interest in politics. Other activities, of course, could and should also be included. Voting is regarded as the classic participant role. Party and other organizational memberships, officeholding in public or private organizations, political speech making, and many other activities might be indicative of conventional participation. We would argue that citizens seeking redress from government are participating, too. In fact, since such activities normally require a high degree of motivation, information, and political skills, they might well be classified as a relatively high order of political activity though they are seldom given attention in the literature on participation. Our discussion below is deliberately eclectic, seeking to apply a broad and inclusive definition of participation. We consider specifically and in a degree of detail, participation through party membership and identification, and through voting, and, in less detail, other forms of participation.

  Partisan Identification and Party Membership

  Party membership and identification constitute a major form of participation in many countries. Particularly at early stages of the evolution of modern democratic development, parties were critical engines of political mobilization, acting as intermediaries between elites and voters. The electorate generally lacked education and political skills. As Inglehart and Klingemann (1979: 207) put it, parties and other "elite-directed" institutions such as church and union "were effective in bringing large numbers of newly enfranchised citizens to the polls in an era when universal compulsory education had just taken root." "Political Participation," they wrote, "remained relatively dependent on permanently established organizations as long as most people lacked organizational skills." According to them, however, rising levels of education and political skills in the twentieth century have created conditions for a second path to mobilization—an "elite challenging mode." It is this mode that has been identified as the "new politics" of direct action. In this more populist style of politics, "ad hoc organizations can be brought into being in response to any current political issue because the public has an unprecedentedly large leavening of potential counter-elites. Effective boycotts, demonstrations, and similar activities can be organized and publicized by skilled amateurs, acting outside established channels" (Inglehart and Klingemann 1979: 208). Dalton's "mass mobilization typology" further distinguishes between these two principal, but different sources of mobilization to political action: the first, he calls "partisan" and the second "cognitive." Partisan mobilization occurs when parties provide political cues to citizens. Cognitive mobilization occurs when citizens develop the necessary skills "to orient themselves to politics without depending on party labels." Like Inglehart and Klingemann, Dalton (1984: 271) associates cognitive mobilization (their "elite challenging participation") with the generally rising levels of education and political sophistication in industrial countries, and with a psychological involvement in politics that is absent in the case of partisan mobilization. "When citizens of these countries [that are low in cognitive mobilization] become mobilized into politics, it is largely through partisan channels" (Dalton 1984: 271; and see Inglehart 1970).

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  Political and Civic Engagement

  Multidisciplinary perspectives

  • Martyn Barrett, Bruna Zani(Authors)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  et al . 1978: 47).

  This way of thinking about Political Participation at least implicitly opened up analyses of activities that included not only voting behaviour, but also, for example, demonstrations, strikes, boycotts and other forms of protest behaviour. This line of thought was also quite early on followed by Barnes and Kaase in their seminal work on Political Action (Barnes and Kaase et al . 1979; Kaase and Marsh 1979; cf. Verba and Nie 1972; Verba et al . 1995; Montero et al . 2007: 434). Consequently, actions directed against all political, societal, media or economic actors (or elites) could be analysed as ‘Political Participation’ (Teorell et al . 2007: 335–6; Norris 2002: 193).

  More recent definitions of Political Participation have thus tended to be wider in scope. Brady, for example, defines Political Participation as ‘action by ordinary citizens directed toward influencing some political outcomes’ (Brady 1999: 737; cf. Teorell et al . 2007: 336). Brady emphasises that we should think about Political Participation firstly as manifest and observable actions or activities that people voluntarily take part in. Secondly, ‘people’ means ordinary citizens, not political elites or civil servants. Thirdly, the concept refers to deliberate attempts to influence the people in power, to make a difference. To be interested in politics and societal issues, or even to discuss politics frequently, is not enough, Brady tells us. Political Participation refers to attempts to influence others – any powerful actors, groups or business enterprises in society – and their decisions that concern societal issues. Brady thus offers us a wider definition of Political Participation. At the same time, one could argue that Brady too tends to place more weight on actions directed at political elites than on actions directed at other elites. This has in fact been a typical feature of the research field; even if scholars have suggested ever broader definitions of Political Participation, focus has remained on a more confined set of citizen activities. To give but one example, Parry et al . (1992) define Political Participation as ‘action by citizens which is aimed at influencing decisions which are, in most cases, ultimately taken by public representatives and officials’ (Parry et al

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  Young People and Politics in the UK

  Apathy or Alienation?

  • D. Marsh, T. O´Toole, S. Jones(Authors)
  • 2006(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  Secondly, there is a lack of serious study of non-participation. As we have noted previously, many studies equate non-participation, defined in the researcher’s own terms, with polit- ical apathy. Put simply, it is frequently assumed that if individuals do not engage in the activities that researchers take to represent Political Participation, they are politically apathetic. In our view, this is an unsustainable proposition because Political Participation, defined in this way, has a number of ‘others’, including apathy, alienation/disaffection and other types of participation. Third, and perhaps this is unsurprising given the behaviouralist/intentionalist approach of researchers like Pattie et al. (2004), age, class, ethnicity and gender are viewed merely as independent variables, rather than as ‘lived experience’ and, hence, the relationship between these and political engagement is poorly understood. Finally, as Bang (2004) argues, most researchers pay insufficient attention to the broader The Study of Political Participation 19 context of patterns of governance and citizenship, the ways in which they are changing and the consequences of these for Political Participation. In the sections below, we develop the first three of these arguments, returning to the fourth in the next chapter. 1.2.1 A narrow conception of the political Parry et al.’s (1992) influential study of Political Participation defined it as ‘taking part in the processes of formulation, passage and implement- ation of public policies’; or ‘action which seeks to shape the attitudes of decision-makers to matters yet to be decided, or action in protest against the outcome of some decision’ (1992, p. 16). They focused on particular types of Political Participation: voting; party member- ship; joining an interest group; contacting MPs or councillors; signing petitions; and taking part in a demonstration. Individuals were then asked which of these activities they engaged in and how frequently.

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  Poverty of Democracy

  The Institutional Roots of Political Participation in Mexico

  • Claudio A. Holzner(Author)
  • 2010(Publication Date)
  • University of Pittsburgh Press

    (Publisher)

  It takes seriously the political and social context within which decisions to become politically active are made; it has alerted many researchers to the seemingly obvious fact that politics matters for Political Participation. Perhaps most importantly and fruitfully, by raising our gaze up from the individual and broadening our analysis to include the political context in which actors find themselves, the mobiliza-tional approach allows us to see familiar patterns in new ways. In the words of Rosenstone and Hansen (1993, 234), The withdrawal of citizens from electoral politics is not wholly of their own choos-ing, is neither the product of satisfaction or despair. The influx of citizens into governmental politics is likewise not wholly of their own choosing, is neither the product of enthusiasm nor cynicism. . . . Once we take Political Participation out of the realm of the attitudinal and place it in the sphere of the political, once we find its causes not only in individuals but also in the political system, the mean-ing of citizen participation in a democracy changes dramatically. By itself, citizen involvement implies neither legitimacy nor vigilance, neither contentment nor es-trangement, neither virtue nor indifference. Instead, Political Participation tells us more about a political system than about its citizens. The principal weakness of mobilizational explanations of political partic-ipation is that they stop short in their search for institutional influences on Political Participation by leaving the state out of their analysis. Although the activities of organizations and their interactions with political parties and 38  Toward an Institutional Theory of Political Participation elites certainly matter, they are not the only and usually not the most impor-tant sources of opportunities and constraints for citizen political action. The state also has enormous influence on who participates and how they do so.

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  Activating the Citizen

  Dilemmas of Participation in Europe and Canada

  • J. DeBardeleben, J. Pammett, J. DeBardeleben, J. Pammett(Authors)
  • 2009(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  Members’ extra-curricular learning occurred at evening sessions at the hotel where ad hoc groups formed to discuss issues before the assem- bly met that weekend. Weekly surveys indicated that CA members felt well supported and that plenary presentations were neutral. The crucial measurement of neutrality was upheld with 93.3 per cent of members saying that ‘the presentation of the options of the Academic Director and research staff’ was very or somewhat unbiased. In the Netherlands, answering a yes/no question, 80 per cent agreed that the staff did not have a preference. All of this suggests that citizens have the capacity to 230 Activating the Citizen learn and that institutions can be established that aid in that endeavour without ‘leading’ citizens to a particular outcome. Conclusion Political Participation can be defined by adversarial activities that place a premium on individual interest aggregation. Much of political science is devoted to examining these activities. Another older form of partici- pation stresses the importance of talk that is framed around consensus. According to this view, citizens talking to citizens about politics is the essence of democracy. This chapter has explored three case studies of this form of democratic participation. The creation of a civic space where equality, fairness, and an open mind are the goals is the hallmark of this kind of participatory democracy. CAs are an excellent – and far too rare – example of this type of robust par- ticipation. They are unique because they represent a transformation of citizens into citizen-experts through an in-depth educational programme and remind us about the capacity of citizens to make sound policy. Their democratic procedures and transparency provide a rare instance of par- ticipatory democracy that is not grounded in adversarial relationships but shared values.

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