Abstract
This study investigates; (1) how Political Cynicism is structured and, (2) how this structure relates to Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) and Social Dominance Orientation (SDO) in 11 Ibero-American countries (N=2388). The results show that the structure of Political Cynicism is composed of four dimensions: (1) Mistrust, (2) Perception of Corruption, (3) Need for Change and, (4) Political Moral Laxity. Furthermore, the study reveals that there is no homogeneous model of relations between the dimensions of Political Cynicism with RWA and SDO by country. However, at a general level it is noted that Mistrust acts as a diffuse indicator of dissatisfaction with the political system that increases Political Moral Laxity, while the Perception of Corruption, functions as a specific indicator of dissatisfaction that is directly associated with the Need for Change and, inversely, to Moral Laxity. Both RWA and SDO increase the negative manifestations of Political Cynicism, but the most interesting result is the stability of the observed relationship between SDO and Moral Laxity in 10 of the 11 countries considered in the study. The results are discussed in terms of the costs that Political Cynicism represents for the consolidation of Democracy, especially in its manifestation of moral laxity.
References
Barlach, L. (2013). O Jeitinho Brasileiro: traço da identidade nacional?. Revista Gestão & Políticas Públicas, 3(2). Retrieved from http://www.revistas.usp.br/rgpp/article/view/98574
Bélanger, E. & Aarts, K. (2006). Explaining the rise of the LPF: Issues, discontent and the 2002 Dutch election. Acta Politica, 41, 4-20. https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.ap.5500135
Beramendi, M. & Zubieta, E. (2014). Construcción y validación de la Escala de Percepción del Sistema Normativo. Revista Mexicana de Psicología, 31, 124-137. Retrieved from http://www.redalyc.org/pdf/2430/243033031005.pdf
Beramendi, M. (2014). Percepción del sistema normativo, transgresión y sus correlatos psicosociales en Argentina (Unpublished Doctoral Thesis), Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Cappella, J., & Jamieson, K. (1996). News frames, political cynicism, and media cynicism. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 546(1), 71-84.
Cárdenas, M., & Parra, L. (2010). Adaptación y validación de la Versión Abreviada de la Escala de Autoritarismos de Derechas (RWA) en una muestra chilena. Revista de Psicología, 19(1), 61-79.
Cárdenas, M., Meza, P., Lagues, K., & Yañez, S. (2010). Adaptación y validación de la Escala de Orientación a la Dominancia Social (SDO) en una muestra chilena. Universitas Psychologica, 9(1), 161-168.
Chaparro, H. (2018). Afectos y desafectos. Las diversas subculturas políticas en Lima. Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima, Perú.
Duckitt, J., & Sibley, C. (2010). Personality, ideology, prejudice, and politics: A dual‐process motivational model. Journal of personality, 78(6), 1861-1894.
Eurobarómetro Standard 90 (2018). Opinión Pública en la Unión Europea (Informe Nacional). Retrieved from: https://ec.europa.eu/spain/sites/spain/files/st90_-_report_repes_-_vf110219_limpia_.pdf
Fu, H., Mou, Y., Miller, M. J., & Jalette, G. (2011). Reconsidering political cynicism and political involvement: A test of antecedents. American Communication Journal, 13(2), 44-61.
Gächter, S. & Schulz, J. F. (2016). Intrinsic honesty and the prevalence of rule violations across societies. Nature, 531, 496-499. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature17160
Girola, L. (2011). La cultura de la transgresión. Anomias y cultura del "como si" en la sociedad mexicana. Estudios Sociológicos, 39(85), 99-129.
Jackson, L. E. & Gaertner, L. (2010). Mechanisms of moral disengagement and their differential use by right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation in support of war. Aggressive Behavior, 36, 238-250. https://doi.org/10.1002/ab.20344
Janos, E., Espinosa, A., & Pacheco, M. (2018). Bases Ideológicas de la Percepción del Sistema Normativo y el Cinismo Político en Adultos de Sectores Urbanos del Perú. Psykhe, 27(1), 1-14.
Latinobarómetro (2019). Informe 2018. Corporación Latinobarómetro, Santiago de Chile. Retrieved from: http://www.latinobarometro.org/latContents.jsp
Levitt, B. S. (2015). Discrimination and the distrust of democratic institutions in Latin America. Politics, Groups, and Identities, 3(3), 417-437. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21565503.2015.1050410
Manjón, M., Cisneros, A., Otero, J., Goyburu, L., Cruz, F., Tricot, V., & Garrido, M. (2020). América Latina 2019: Vuelta a la inestabilidad. Iberoamericana, 20(73), 205-241.
Mezulis, A. H., Abramson, L. Y., Hyde, J. S., & Hankin, B. L. (2004). Is there a universal positivity bias in attributions? A meta-analytic review of individual, developmental, and cultural differences in the self-serving attributional bias. Psychological bulletin, 130(5), 711.
Miller, A. H. (1974). Political issues and trust in government: 1964-1970. American Political Science Review, 68, 951-972. https://doi.org/10.2307/1959140
Monsegur, S., Espinosa, A. & Beramendi, M. (2014) Identidad nacional y su relación con la dominancia social y la tolerancia a la trangresión en residentes de Buenos Aires (Argentina). Interdisciplinaria, 31, 5-23. https://doi.org/10.16888/interd.2014.31.1.1
Patterson, T. E. (2002) The vanishing voter: Public involvement in an age of uncertainty. Alfred A. Knopf.
Porter, J. (2007). Using structural equation modeling to examine the relationship between political cynicism and right-wing authoritarianism. Sociological Spectrum, 28, 36-54. https://doi.org/10.1080/02732170701675128
Pratto, F., Sidanius, J., Stallworth, L., & Mallé, B. (1994). Social Dominance Orientation: A personality variable predicting social and political attitudes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67(4), 741-763.
Quiroz, A. W. (2013). Historia de la corrupción en el Perú. Instituto de Estudios Peruanos.
Ramos, J. (8 de noviembre de 2019). El malestar en América Latina. The New York Times. Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/es/2019/11/08/espanol/opinion/protestas-america-latina.html
Rotenberg, K.J. (2020). The Psychology of Interpersonal Trust. Theory and Research. Routledge.
Sautu, R. (2018). La corrupción endémica en un país prebendatario: un intento de construcción teórica. In E. M. Zubieta, J.F. Valencia y G.I. Delfino (Coordinadores). Psicología Social y Política. Procesos Teóricos y Estudios Aplicados (pp.64-83). ECOE & EUDEBA.
Schmitz, M. & Espinosa, A. (2015). Ideología, emocionalidad y crisis de gobernabilidad en Lima Metropolitana: un estudio correlacional sobre el proceso de revocatoria del 2013. Revista Electrónica de Psicología Política, 34, 46-63. Retrieved from http://www.psicopol.unsl.edu.ar/2015-Julio-Art%EDculo03.pdf
Segovia, C. (2008). Political Trust in Latin America (Unpublished Doctoral Thesis). Political Science, University of Michigan, The United States of America.
Siu-kai, L. (1992). Decline of governmental authority, political cynicism and political inefficacy in Hong Kong. Journal of Northeast Asian Studies, 11(2), 3-20. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03023340
Tyler, T. R. (2001). Public trust and confidence in legal authorities: What do majority and minority group members want from the law and legal institutions? Behavioral Sciences & the Law, 19, 215-235. https://doi.org/10.1002/bsl.438
Zakrisson, I. (2005). Construction of a short version of the Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) scale. Personality and Individual Differences, 39(5), 863-872.
Zmerli, S., & Castillo, J. C. (2015). Income inequality, distributive fairness and political trust in Latin America. Social Science Research, 52, 179-192.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Copyright (c) 2022 Agustín Espinosa, Manuel Pacheco, Erika Janos, Yorelis Acosta, Edilberto Álvarez-Galeano, Jaime Berenguer, Victor Jiménez-Benítez, Harry Lewis, Maria Lily Maric, Julián Martínez, Elvira Riba, Juan Carlos Romero, Salvador Sandoval, Juan Valencia-Moya, Angela Vera-Ruíz