Explaining public support for violence against politicians during conflict: Evidence from a panel study in Israel

2020 ◽  
pp. 002234332090535
Author(s):  
Julia Elad-Strenger ◽  
Brian J Hall ◽  
Stevan E Hobfoll ◽  
Daphna Canetti
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Distress ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
Panel Study ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Political Stability ◽  
Political Orientation ◽  
Interactive Effects ◽  
Perceived Threat ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Protective Strategy

What drives citizens’ support for violence against domestic political actors? Despite its potentially devastating consequences, there is surprisingly little research on the antecedents of this unique form of political violence. Building upon recent insights on the psychological implications of exposure to conflict on support for political violence, we examined the motivations underlying public support for violence against politicians in the context of protracted conflict. Using a two-wave panel design among Jewish-Israelis, we examined the interactive effects of conflict-induced perceived threat, psychological distress, and political orientation on support for violence against politicians. Consistent with previous findings on the psychological implications of conflict, our findings suggest that conflict-induced threat perceptions play an important role in predicting support for violence against politicians. Nevertheless, our findings point to important boundary conditions to these effects: the strength of the relationship between perceived threat and attitudes towards political violence is qualified by the level of chronic conflict-related psychological distress, and the direction of the effects of perceived threat is qualified by individuals’ self-placement on the left-right continuum. More specifically, we found that perceived threat increased rightists’ support and decreases leftists’ support for violence against politicians, only under high, but not low, conflict-related psychological distress. The main conclusion of this study is that support for violence against politicians can be seen as an ideology-driven protective strategy against the negative psychological implications of exposure to violent conflict. By pointing to the importance of understanding the interactive role of psychological and political factors in determining public support for such acts, our findings therefore contribute to the understanding of a relatively understudied phenomenon with potentially catastrophic effects on political stability.

scholarly journals Early life adversity increases the salience of later life stress: an investigation of interactive effects in the PSID

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine Saxton ◽  
Laura Chyu
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Distress ◽  
Early Life ◽  
Chronic Conditions ◽  
Risk Model ◽  
Panel Study ◽  
Large Body ◽  
Poor Health ◽  
Interactive Effects ◽  
Early Life Adversity ◽  
Fair Poor

AbstractA large body of evidence has shown that stress throughout life is associated with health trajectories, but the combination of adverse experiences at different stages of the life course is not yet well understood. This study examines the interactions between childhood adversity, adulthood adversity, and adult physical and mental health. Using data from The Childhood Retrospective Circumstances Study (CRCS) supplement to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), we created indices of early life adversity (EAI) and adult adversity (AAI). We used logistic regression to examine the effects of EAI and AAI, adjusting for age, sex, race/ethnicity, health behaviors, and childhood health as covariates in all models. We repeated this analysis for the outcomes of fair/poor health, two or more chronic conditions, and psychological distress in adulthood. For all the three outcomes, our findings suggest increasing salience of adult adversity among those who experienced higher levels of early adversity. Individuals with high EAI and high AAI exhibited the highest odds of fair/poor health (OR = 5.71), chronic conditions (OR = 3.06), and psychological distress (OR = 13.08) compared to those with low EAI and low AAI. These findings are consistent with the accumulation of risk or dual risk model of stress and health. Adversity in childhood amplifies the health risks associated with stress in adulthood for multiple health outcomes.

scholarly journals Mental health in higher education students and non-students: evidence from a nationally representative panel study

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evangeline Tabor ◽  
Praveetha Patalay ◽  
David Bann
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Higher Education ◽  
Psychological Distress ◽  
Panel Study ◽  
Education Students ◽  
Lower Odds ◽  
Score Difference ◽  
Mental Health Support ◽  
Health Support ◽  
Nationally Representative

AbstractDespite increasing policy focus on mental health provision for higher education students, it is unclear whether they have worse mental health outcomes than their non-student peers. In a nationally-representative UK study spanning 2010–2019 (N = 11,519), 17–24 year olds who attended higher education had lower average psychological distress (GHQ score difference =  − 0.37, 95% CI − 0.60, − 0.08) and lower odds of case-level distress than those who did not (OR = 0.91, 95% CI 0.81, 1.02). Increases in distress between 2010 and 2019 were similar in both groups. Accessible mental health support outside higher education settings is necessary to prevent further widening of socioeconomic inequalities in mental health.

Gbagbo will return to frontline Ivory Coast politics

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Ivory Coast ◽  
Political Stability ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Election Victory

Significance Instead he aims to create a new party. The FPI has since denied reports of mass defections by the party grassroots to Gbagbo. This comes in the context of broader public reconciliation efforts by President Alassane Ouattara, who seeks political stability in the aftermath of a highly controversial October 2020 third-term election victory. Impacts Ouattara is unlikely to grant general amnesty to all political actors in order to keep some of them outside the country. Gbagbo will likely win over most, though not all, of his former supporters within the FPI. Struggles within Gbagbo’s former party and other opposition formations will weaken the opposition in the short term. Gbagbo will consolidate his position as the main opposition leader, threatening the country’s stability in the lead-up to the 2025 election.

Mobilising ‘Minutemen’: Predicting Public Support for Anti-Immigration Activism in the United States

2013 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 195-212
Author(s):  
Matthew Ward
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cultural Beliefs ◽  
Public Support ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Orientation ◽  
Willingness To Participate ◽  
Sequential Process ◽  
Economic Threat ◽  
Nationally Representative ◽  
Actual Participation

Advances in social movement research conceptualise micromobilisation as – at least – a two-step sequential process in which willingness to participate must first be generated and then translated into actual participation. However, such research often ignores a more fundamental first step in this process: the generation of movement support. I address this gap by drawing on a nationally representative sample of adults in the United States – who either sympathised with or opposed anti-immigration activism – to identify individual attributes differentiating anti-immigration movement supporters and non-supporters. Perceptions of economic threat, waning confidence in political leadership, and prejudicial cultural beliefs about Latinos represent attributes differentiated movement supporters from non-supporters. Power devaluation theory is used as an overarching framework to meaningfully interpret these results. More generally, I argue that grievances play an important, yet under theorised role in jumpstarting conservative micromobilisation and that principles from power devaluation theory can help us understand the differentiation of movement support, irrespective of a social movement's political orientation.

Explaining Public Support for the Use of Military Force: The Impact of Reference Point Framing and Prospective Decision Making

2011 ◽  
Vol 65 (1) ◽  
pp. 139-167 ◽  
Author(s):  
Héctor Perla
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Reference Point ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Public Support ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Military Force ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Impact

AbstractThis article examines the determinants of public support for the use of military force. It puts forward a Framing Theory of Policy Objectives (FTPO), which contends that public support for military engagements depends on the public's perception of the policy's objective. However, it is difficult for the public to judge a policy's objective because they cannot directly observe a policy's true intention and influential political actors offer competing frames to define it. This framing contestation, carried out through the media, sets the public's decision-making reference point and determines whether the policy is perceived as seeking to avoid losses or to achieve gains. The FTPO predicts that support will increase when the public perceives policies as seeking to prevent losses and decrease when the public judges policies to be seeking gains. I operationalize and test the theory using content analysis of national news coverage and opinion polls of U.S. intervention in Central America during the 1980s. These framing effects are found to hold regardless of positive or negative valence of media coverage.

Violence against Women in Politics

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mona Lena Krook
Keyword(s):  
Political Violence ◽  
Violence Against Women ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Women In Politics ◽  
Equal Rights ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The World ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Ongoing Dialogue

Women have made significant inroads into politics in recent years, but in many parts of the world, their increased engagement has spurred attacks, intimidation, and harassment intended to deter their participation. This book provides the first comprehensive account of this phenomenon, exploring how women came to give these experiences a name—violence against women in politics—and lobby for its increased recognition by citizens, states, and international organizations. Drawing on research in multiple disciplines, the volume resolves lingering ambiguities regarding its contours by arguing that violence against women in politics is not simply a gendered extension of existing definitions of political violence privileging physical aggressions against rivals. Rather, it is a distinct phenomenon involving a broad range of harms to attack and undermine women as political actors. Incorporating a wide range of country examples, the book illustrates what this violence looks like in practice, catalogues emerging solutions around the world, and considers how to document this phenomenon more effectively. Highlighting its implications for democracy, human rights, and gender equality, the volume concludes that tackling violence against women in politics requires ongoing dialogue and collaboration to ensure women’s equal rights to participate—freely and safely—in political life around the globe.

Are the Effects of Legitimacy and Its Components Invariant? Operationalization and the Generality of Sunshine and Tyler’s Empowerment Hypothesis

2020 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-40
Author(s):  
Bryanna Fox ◽  
Richard K. Moule ◽  
Chae M. Jaynes ◽  
Megan M. Parry
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Public Support ◽  
National Sample ◽  
Ordinary Least Squares ◽  
Interactive Effects ◽  
Direct Effects ◽  
Military Equipment ◽  
Interaction Terms ◽  
Normative Factors ◽  
The Relationship

Objectives: To assess whether the relationship between legitimacy and police empowerment is sensitive to the operationalization of legitimacy, and whether the effects of legitimacy and its components on empowerment are invariant. Empowerment is examined in the context of police militarization—public support for the discretionary use of surplus military equipment by law enforcement. Method: Using a national sample of 702 American adults and a series of ordinary least squares regressions, the direct and interactive effects of legitimacy and its components on empowerment are examined. Results: The composite measure of legitimacy, as well as its individual components, each exert direct effects on police empowerment. Instrumental factors have persisting, albeit weaker, effects relative to normative factors. Interaction terms between the composite legitimacy measure or its components and sociodemographic characteristics were not statistically significant. In short, the effects of legitimacy and its components on empowerment appear invariant. Conclusions: Findings provide additional evidence of the generality of Tyler’s process–based model and extend these considerations to the burgeoning literature on public empowerment of police.

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