• darkblurbg
    Canadian Political Science Association
    2020 Annual Conference Programme

    Confronting Political Divides
    Hosted at Western University
    Tuesday, June 2 to Thursday, June 4, 2020
  • darkblurbg
    Presidential Address:
    Barbara Arneil, CPSA President

    Origins:
    Colonies and Statistics

    Location:
    Tuesday, June 2, 2020 | 05:00pm to 06:00pm
  • darkblurbg
    KEYNOTE SPEAKER:
    Ayelet Shachar
    The Shifting Border:
    Legal Cartographies of Migration
    and Mobility

    Location:
    June 04, 2020 | 01:30 to 03:00 pm
  • darkblurbg
    Keynote Speaker: Marc Hetherington
    Why Modern Elections
    Feel Like a Matter of
    Life and Death

    Location:
    Wednesday, June 3, 2020 | 03:45pm to 05:15pm
  • darkblurbg
    Plenary Panel
    Indigenous Politics and
    the Problem of Canadian
    Political Science

    Location: Arts & Humanities Building - AHB 1R40
    Tuesday, June 2, 2020 | 10:30am to 12:00pm

Political Behaviour/Sociology



F18(a) - Social Categories and Social Networks

Date: Jun 4 | Time: 12:00pm to 01:30pm | Location:

Chair/Président/Présidente : Maxime Coulombe (Université de Montréal)

Discussant/Commentateur/Commentatrice : Dominik Stecula (University of Pennsylvania)

Tales of a Liberal Country: National Identification and Life Satisfaction in Canada ?: Alexis Bibeau (University of Virginia), Maxime Blanchard (McGill University), Marc-Antoine Rancourt (Université Laval), Yannick Dufresne (Université Laval)
Abstract: This article examines the link between ideology and life satisfaction in Canada. Literature shows that system-justification ideologies and social identity may contribute to account for one’s subjective well-being. From a cognitive perspective standpoint, justifying the system and its impact on people’s lives allows one to rationalize the state of the world, helping them reach a higher level of life satisfaction. From an affective standpoint, however, social identity theory posits that people are inclined to categorize themselves – and others – as objective members of groups with which they develop a sense of psychological attachment. Such a national identification is expected to have a significant impact on individuals’ subjective well-being: the more important a group membership is to one’s personal identity, the more that group is tied to his life satisfaction. Canada being a country favoring left-leaning social and economic policies, it leads us to expect leftist citizens to display more positive evaluations of their country, and thus greater levels of subjective well-being. Onthe other hand, many studies – mainly in the US — show conservative individuals to be more likely toengage in system-justification processes, and therefore display greater levels of life satisfaction. Using datafrom the Canadian Election Study and the Word Value Survey, as well as exclusive survey data collected bycrowd-sourcing with Amazon Mechanical Turk, this article assess whether the relationship between ideology, life satisfaction and subjective well-being is mediated by the national political environment.


The Influence of Friends and Neighbours on Voter Turnout: Maxime Héroux-Legault (University of British Columbia), Maxime Coulombe (Université de Montréal), André Blais (Université de Montréal), Carol Galais (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona)
Abstract: Although the decision to vote is generally considered in the literature as an individual choice, several studies have shown that social networks and the social pressure can have a tangible effect on voter turnout. Experimental studies have shown that social pressure comes from neighbours (Gerber et al., 2008; Panagopoulos 2010; Rogers et al., 2017) and friends (Bond et al., 2012). However, other studies suggested that social pressure is particularly influential in the household environment (Nickerson 2008, Fieldhouse and Cutts 2012, 2018). In this study, we contribute to this literature in two ways. Firstly, the experimental research described above focuses on the role of social pressure to vote in the United States. We innovate by using survey data from several democracies, including Canada, the United Kingdom, Austria, Switzerland and the United States. Secondly, we aim to establish a dialogue between the experimental and observational literature on the issue of social pressure to vote outside the household. These two research strategies have complementary strengths. Experiments have high internal validity and generally a lower ecological validity while observational studies have a high ecological validity and a low internal validity. The experimental literature shows that the social networks outside the household have an important role to play in turnout. However, our results show that these conclusions are not supported according to the survey data.


Crooks or Saints? Assessing Stereotypes Associated with Federal Political Parties in Canada: Joanie Bouchard (University of Western Ontario)
Abstract: Stereotypes are defined as the mental representations of social categories used to make sense of one’s environment. Just like voters formulate certain expectations regarding politicians in general, their attitude and their looks, they also develop a particular mental image of candidates belonging to different parties. This article looks at the content of stereotypes associated with federal political parties in Canada. To do so, we consider open-ended questions from the CES’ post-electoral survey regarding voters’ impressions of each federal political party. Through a content analysis, we offer a descriptive account of party stereotypes in Canada at the federal level and assess variations between voters based on the social groups they may be associated with. We focus in particular on differences in parties’ images in different regions of Canada to determine if particular social narratives may be present in some provinces.


Distant Neighbours: How Local Context Shapes Mobility Assessments and Support for Redistribution: Sophie Borwein (University of Toronto)
Abstract: In this paper, I examine how individuals use information they derive from their local contexts to draw conclusions about their economic prospects and, by extension, their preferences for redistribution. I argue that people assess their economic mobility with reference to the economic conditions of their neighbours, to whom they tie their own prospects. Where they live among many well-off neighbours, they will understand themselves to be on a positive trajectory; where they live among many poorer neighbours, they will worry about their downward mobility. More narrowly, I argue that people’s judgments of their mobility prospects depend foremost on the economic position of their co-ethnic neighbours, since it is to this group that people will feel their own prospects are most closely tied. These assessments in turn shape support for redistribution—where people are pessimistic about their prospects, they support greater redistribution as insurance against possible income loss. Using Statistics Canada census micro-data linked by postal code to survey data from the Local Parliament Project (Loewen, Koop, and Rubenson 2018) and 2015 Canadian Elections Study, I show that respondents living among many well-off co-ethnic neighbours feel more secure in their own economic position, and are less supportive of paying taxes.


Toward a Theory and Measure of Benevolent Racism: Edana Beauvais (Harvard University), Adam Enders (University of Louisville)
Abstract: Nearly all existing work on racial prejudice considers explicitly hostile outgroup evaluations. What about racial attitudes that appear subjectively positive (positive to those who hold the views) but reinforce racial inequality more broadly? Research in social psychology shows that sexist attitudes are ambivalent; sexism can be hostile or benevolent (Glick 1996). Building on the nascent idea that racial prejudice also ranges from hostile to benevolent (Esposito 2014), we theorize the concept of “benevolent racism” and develop comparable measures of Whites’ benevolent attitudes toward Black and Indigenous peoples in the United States and Canada, respectively. Unlike hostile prejudicial attitudes, benevolent racial attitudes may motivate support for redistributive policies—but policies that undermine racial equality more generally by reinforcing target group members’ subordination through assimilation and surveillance. Our scales of benevolent racism discriminate between racial liberals (who feel positively toward racial minorities and want to help) from racial conservatives (who do not). The scale also helps distinguish between racial liberals who support policies designed to “help” that ultimately reinforce minorities’ subordination from racial liberals who support policies that empower Indigenous and Black communities. We discuss how hostile and benevolent racial attitudes work in tandem to reinforce the subordination of racial minorities in social hierarchies.




Return to Home