Regional Economic Development and the Change of Political Culture:An Empirical Study of the Fourth Wave of Asian Barometer Survey
Based on the data of the Fourth Wave of Asian Barometer Survey(ABS 2015),combined with modernization theory and cultural change theory,this paper empirically analyzes the impact of the level of economic development on the change of political culture.The results indicate that:(1)The basis of political culture in China is changing quietly with the development of economic level,and the political culture/values held by people will change from the traditional(authoritarian)and neo-traditional political culture(collectivism and nationalism)to a more modern culture pursuing equal rights and rule of law;(2)The level of regional economic development does not directly affect people's political culture,but through mediating variables such as raising people's income level,education level,and frequency of internet use;(3)The value of democracy is the only value in modern political culture that decreases rather than increases with the level of economic development,possibly explained by the fact that higher levels of education and internet access make residents of developed regions identify the concept of"democracy"more as Western-style democracy,while residents of less developed regions identify it as people's democracy.If the above static observation is introduced into a dynamic perspective,it is reasonable to believe that,the mainstream political culture of our people will gradually change from the original traditional and neo-traditional political culture to a modern political culture over time.However,in terms of democratic value,it is possible to form democratic values of the people with Chinese characteristics that are distinct from Western democratic values.Compared with the previous literature,this paper expands in the following three aspects:first,it is different from the existing studies that focus on the changes of individual or a few political values.In order to more comprehensively explore the impact of economic development on specific political cultures at different stages of history,this paper provides a more comprehensive typology of political values at different stages of history;second,in terms of research methodology,the empirical strategies of existing studies have focused on dealing with the relationship between variables at a single level,ignoring the ecological fallacy that may arise from stratified data.Moreover,most of the studies focus on specific groups or localized regions,with limitations in terms of the generalizability and representativeness of the conclusions;thirdly,the theoretical mechanisms by which economic development influences the change of political cultural are explored,which further contributes to a deeper understanding of the relationship between the two.
regional economic developmentpolitical culturecultural changemodernization theoryvaluesthe concept of democracy
万方数据
