scholarly journals Enemies of Democracy?: An exploration of the relationship between the authoritarian predisposition and attitudes toward democracy

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kris Dunn

Historically, authoritarianism has been synonymous with a fascistic or anti-democratic personality or outlook. The idea that the more authoritarian are hostile to democratic governance has continued from the first incarnation of the concept through to the more recent conceptualization of authoritarianism as a values orientation concerned with the trade-off between social conformity and individual autonomy. The research reported here explores how authoritarianism, as a values orientation, relates to attitudes toward democracy. Given the ‘dynamic’ relationship theorized between authoritarianism and social and political attitudes, this research also looks into whether and how perceived threat and societal views of democracy moderate the relationship between authoritarianism and attitudes toward democracy. Findings from analyses of data from Wave 6 or the World Values Survey indicate that 1.) authoritarianism is positively related to more favorable views of democracy; 2.) greater perceived threat is related to a more favorable view of democracy among the more authoritarian, while the more libertarian exhibit little variation across perceived threat; and 3.) aggregate support for democracy does not significantly change the relationship between authoritarianism and attitudes toward democracy. The importance of these findings on the literature and the current political events are discussed.

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 609-633
Author(s):  
Marko Valenta ◽  
Zan Strabac

AbstractThis article examines the relationship between religiosity and support for democracy in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Using data from the last World Values Survey, we examine levels of religiosity among Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats, and their support for democracy. The influence of religiosity on support for democracy is also explored. The results indicate that religiosity has a negative influence on support for democracy, and it is particularly true for individuals who do not support the separation of the religious from the political sphere and who exhibit lower support for democracy. The article also examines different levels of religiosity among the three groups, controlling for a wide range of variables. We conclude that there is basically no difference in support for democracy between Croats and Bosniaks, while Serbs exhibit somewhat lesser support for democracy than members of the other two ethnic groups. Serbs also seem to be somewhat less religious than Bosniaks and Croats. Opposition to separation of the religious from the political sphere is a major source of lack of support for democracy among Croats and Bosniaks, but not among Serbs.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kris Dunn

The more authoritarian an individual, the more socio-culturally conservative their attitudes and the more they yield to authority. The more authoritarian should, therefore, be more supportive of political institutions than their more libertarian counterparts. Building on recent research, I further hypothesize that differences across authoritarianism in support for political institutions will narrow among those who perceive greater threat. Utilizing data from the World Values Survey, I conduct a series of multilevel analyses examining the relationship between authoritarianism and confidence in the armed forces, police, parliament, government, and courts, conditional on perceived threat. The results demonstrate the more authoritarian are more trusting of political institutions and this relationship is, for some institutions, conditional on perceived threat. These findings add to our understanding of how values orientations can affect individual trust in government institutions and why support for more aggressive solutions to societal problems may dominate when perceived threat becomes more commonplace.


2011 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 297-332
Author(s):  
Kate Zebiri

This article aims to explore the Shaykh-mur?d (disciple) or teacher-pupil relationship as portrayed in Western Sufi life writing in recent decades, observing elements of continuity and discontinuity with classical Sufism. Additionally, it traces the influence on the texts of certain developments in religiosity in contemporary Western societies, especially New Age understandings of religious authority. Studying these works will provide an insight into the diversity of expressions of contemporary Sufism, while shedding light on a phenomenon which seems to fly in the face of contemporary social and religious trends which deemphasize external authority and promote the authority of the self or individual autonomy.


The United Nations Secretary-General and the United Nations Security Council spend significant amounts of time on their relationship with each other. They rely on each other for such important activities as peacekeeping, international mediation, and the formulation and application of normative standards in defense of international peace and security—in other words, the executive aspects of the UN’s work. The edited book The UN Secretary-General and the Security Council: A Dynamic Relationship aims to fill an important lacuna in the scholarship on the UN system. Although there exists an impressive body of literature on the development and significance of the Secretariat and the Security Council as separate organs, an important gap remains in our understanding of the interactions between them. Bringing together some of the most prominent authorities on the subject, this volume is the first book-length treatment of this topic. It studies the UN from an innovative angle, creating new insights on the (autonomous) policy-making of international organizations and adding to our understanding of the dynamics of intra-organizational relationships. Within the book, the contributors examine how each Secretary-General interacted with the Security Council, touching upon such issues as the role of personality, the formal and informal infrastructure of the relationship, the selection and appointment processes, as well as the Secretary-General’s threefold role as a crisis manager, administrative manager, and manager of ideas.


Author(s):  
Chris Jones

This introductory chapter contextualizes the philological study of language during the nineteenth century as a branch of the evolutionary sciences. It sketches in outline the two phases of poetic Anglo-Saxonism for which the rest of the book will subsequently argue in more detail. Moreover, the relationship between Anglo-Saxonism and nineteenth-century medievalism more generally is articulated, and historical analogies are drawn between nineteenth-century Anglo-Saxonism and more recent political events in the Anglophone world. Finally, the scholarly contribution of Fossil Poetry itself is contextualized within English Studies; it is argued that ‘reception’ is one of the primary objects of Anglo-Saxon or Old English studies, and not merely a secondary object of that field’s study.


2021 ◽  
pp. 003151252110059
Author(s):  
Erik Lundkvist ◽  
Henrik Gustafsson ◽  
Gunilla Björklund ◽  
Paul Davis ◽  
Andreas Ivarsson

The present study examined relationships between golfers’ self-perceived emotions (e.g., irritability, nervousness, tension), task-oriented coping, perceived control, and performance during a golf competition. We implemented a process-oriented golf analysis in which competitors rated these variables hole-by-hole in a competitive golf round. Within a two-level Bayesian multivariate autoregressive model, we showed that (a) within persons, emotions and task-oriented coping were reactions that stemmed from performance on the previous hole; and (b) between persons, player skill level predicted both better scores and the ability to limit the influence of negative affect on performance. These findings highlight the complex nature of the relationship between emotions and performance. Future studies might use a similarly ecologically valid research design to more precisely measure aspects of time and potentially moderating effects of player skill level and personality. An increased understanding of the dynamic relationship between emotions and performance can promote the development of effective psychological interventions for optimal performance outcomes.


2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (10) ◽  
pp. 5250-5259 ◽  
Author(s):  
José Manuel Aburto ◽  
Francisco Villavicencio ◽  
Ugofilippo Basellini ◽  
Søren Kjærgaard ◽  
James W. Vaupel

As people live longer, ages at death are becoming more similar. This dual advance over the last two centuries, a central aim of public health policies, is a major achievement of modern civilization. Some recent exceptions to the joint rise of life expectancy and life span equality, however, make it difficult to determine the underlying causes of this relationship. Here, we develop a unifying framework to study life expectancy and life span equality over time, relying on concepts about the pace and shape of aging. We study the dynamic relationship between life expectancy and life span equality with reliable data from the Human Mortality Database for 49 countries and regions with emphasis on the long time series from Sweden. Our results demonstrate that both changes in life expectancy and life span equality are weighted totals of rates of progress in reducing mortality. This finding holds for three different measures of the variability of life spans. The weights evolve over time and indicate the ages at which reductions in mortality increase life expectancy and life span equality: the more progress at the youngest ages, the tighter the relationship. The link between life expectancy and life span equality is especially strong when life expectancy is less than 70 y. In recent decades, life expectancy and life span equality have occasionally moved in opposite directions due to larger improvements in mortality at older ages or a slowdown in declines in midlife mortality. Saving lives at ages below life expectancy is the key to increasing both life expectancy and life span equality.


2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 401-420 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen E. Haynes ◽  
Catherine V. Strauss ◽  
Gregory L. Stuart ◽  
Ryan C. Shorey

The present study sought to examine whether drinking motives (i.e., coping, social, conformity, and enhancement) moderated the relationship between physical, sexual, and psychological dating violence victimization and alcohol-related problems in a sample of drinking college women ( N = 177). Results demonstrated that coping and social drinking motives moderated the relationship between sexual victimization and alcohol problems; conformity, social, and enhancement drinking motives moderated the relationship between alcohol-related problems and physical victimization; no significant findings were evident for psychological aggression victimization. Our results partially support the self-medication model of alcohol use, and this may be particularly relevant to sexual victimization.


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