Core Concept “Political Compass”
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Journal of Social Science Education © JSSE 2010 Volume 9, Number 4, 2010, pp. 45–62 ISSN 1618-5293 Andreas Petrik Core Concept “Political Compass” How Kitschelt’s Model of Liberal, Socialist, Libertarian and Conservative Orientations Can Fill the Ideology Gap in Civic Education International value surveys and misconception studies reveal the crucial role of individual value orientations for political judgment abilities. But in Civic Education, political opinions are generally merely asked for or remain superficial, non-committal statements that don’t get analyzed to foster identity development, perspec- tive-taking and tolerance. Thus, this article discusses Kitschelt’s coordinate system of political preferences as an outstanding solution to fill the ideology gap in Civic Education and therefore to enhance political literacy. At first, I will explain and outline the landscape of the four political ideologies: market-liberalism, conservatism, democratic socialism and left-libertarianism. In addition, I will trace left-libertarianism to its merely known anarchist roots. After that, I will explain how our basic political values are shaped by economic and cultural developments and how they combine to become political ideologies, social milieus and party families. As a third point, I will outline possible applications of Kitschelt’s model for the subject of Civic Education. For that, I propose a map of fundamental controversial issues to help students to discover their own political position. Finally, I will introduce the “Found-a-Village-Project” as highly interactive and controversial scenario to foster political identity formation. Keywords: velop value systems as core concepts. Instead they political cleavages, ideologies, critical thinking skills, emphasize value-neutral, “objective” thinking and political judgment abilities, political compass, “Found- analytical skills. The international IEA Civic Educa- a-Village-Project” tion Study (see Torney-Purta et al. 2001) focuses on basic characteristics of democratic societies, like the 1. The ideology gap in Civic Education willingness to vote and to participate, but also on To obtain political orientation is no simple task. Most democratic skills like tolerance, compromise and co- American students might wonder if Obama’s health operation. “Attitudes” are related to students’ trust care policy is a socialist, a Stalinist or, as it was also in institutions, their country, opportunities for im- labeled, a fascist project. German students could ask migrants, the political rights of women, and future themselves, if the Social Democrats (SPD) became prospect. There we find indeed traces of political ide- a right-wing party, because they cut down on wel- ology, but they are neither systematically asked for fare or if the Christian Conservatives (CDU) did turn nor properly interpreted. left, because they are about to suspend compulsory Youth surveys do normally ask for a self-placement military service. Furthermore, students could get on the left-right scale, but since researchers do not confused about market-liberals like the German Free explain their understanding of these complex terms Democrats (FDP) who appear politically left-winged, (e.g. Schneekloth 2010, 135) they don’t get convinc- as they postulate gay marriage, but also right-winged, ing and significant answers: Instead only a few per- when urging lower taxes for businesses. Students cent of students dare to choose the clear left or right need a dynamic core concept of political cleavages. A side, about 30% place themselves in the middle and (political) compass – as it is defined as an instrument about 20% declare not to be able to understand the for finding direction – could help finding orientation categories well enough to place themselves properly. within political movements, party programs and de- At the same time, those young people show, when cisions and political theories, but also when it comes asked about their primary values, indeed politically to a better understanding of their friends’ and fami- relevant ecological, religious, pacifist or private life lies’ value orientations. This is precisely why most orientations that are far from being apolitical. But National Standards (see e.g. NCSS 2010 or GPJE 2004) they don’t understand themselves as being part of combine their concepts with judgment abilities and political cleavages because they never learned to do individual identity development. Students should so. I call this phenomenon the Ideology gap in Civic learn to distinguish between facts and opinions; Education. they should understand the interactive formation of A couple of classroom studies revealed a lack of ex- values and should learn to be tolerant towards dif- posure to political conflicts (see Niemi, Niemi 2007; ferent value orientations. Additionally, they should Hess, Ganzler 2007, Grammes 1998, 299-332). Neither be able to analyze and solve political conflicts. But do many teachers want to know political standpoints these standards don’t really take their own claim se- of their students nor do they support politically con- riously. Neither American nor German programs de- troversial discussions in the classroom. Even verbally 45 Andreas Petrik Journal of Social Science Education Core Concept “Political Compass” Volume 9, Number 4, 2010, pp. 45–62 open and encouraging teachers can indirectly ex- beliefs. Even worse, there are backfiring effects: Di- clude certain opinions by the power of moderation, rect factual contradiction frequently strengthens the or simply by their comments and reinterpretations, misperception of certain ideological subgroups. or even by ignorance. The IEA study stated only 25 In consequence, ideological orientations them- per cent of students across all countries are ‘often’ selves must become central concepts of Civic Edu- encouraged to state their own point of view. While cation. It is far from being enough to understand in theory many teachers favour critical thinking and how democracies work. Only the reflection of differ- values development, in practice they mostly deliver ent democratic ideologies can lead to a congruent factual information using textbooks, worksheets and world view, promote tolerance as dissociation of nar- teacher talk. row views, reflecting partisanship and the ability to Due to the absence of controversial discussions the change ones perspective. Or, as Joseph Adelson (1971, students‘ own political diversity lays dormant, and 1013) phrases it in his study „the political imagination they easily develop the misperception that „every- of the young adolescent“: The development of a po- body is in the middle“. Or they might believe in the litical identity as process of „struggling to formulate absolute truth of their values, mislabeling dissenting a morally coherent view of how society is and might views as assaults unworthy of proper consideration. and should be arranged“. The resulting fear of being misrecognized, disrespect- The main thesis of my article is that the model of ed and excluded discourages students from partici- “Ultimate values, ideologies and forms of social order” pating in public political discussions which they sense (Kitschelt 1992, 1994, 2003), with slight modifications, as dangerous ventures (Conover, Searing, Crewe 2002). should be considered as indispensable scaffolding for The competence of distinguishing and justifying political literacy. value orientations is not a random topic among oth- ers in Civic Education. Value orientations are psycho- 2. The Kitschelt model and the competitive logically and culturally essential for the democratic space of political thought development of both individuals and even whole Herbert Kitschelt (1992; 1994; 2003) created his model societies. First, they form a developmental task, an as heuristics to outline the competitive space of po- important need of self-recognition and responsibility: litical thought. He examined (new) party programs „acquiring a set of values and an ethical system as a in post-communist as well as in western democra- guide to behavior – developing an ideology“ (Havi- cies and how people’s political preference formation ghurst 1972, 69ff.). related to them. This “political universe” can be cap- Second, the European Values Study and the World tured by the slogans of the French Revolution: liberty, Values Survey (see Inglehart, Welzel 2005 and Welzel, equality, fraternity. They represent three ultimate Inglehart 2009) conveyed empirical evidence that val- values or societal end-states and are associated with ue orientations should be regarded as the central factor complementary, mostly conflicting modes of social of democratization or stagnation – both in democratic organization. The concepts of liberty, equality and and non-democratic societies. However, this is only fraternity vary depending on the political issue they true, according to Inglehart and Welzel, if we measure are applied to. Kitschelt was one of the first theorists and deal with real “deep-rooted civic orientations”. to distinguish between two cleavages that each soci- Simple preferences for democracy, as stated in most ety has to take position on: the distributive cleavage political surveys, are often superficial and instrumen- about resource allocation and the communitarian/ tal. Answers are mainly based on social desirability and socio-cultural one about actors, power and decision- therefore don’t reveal anything about the motivation making. This is one main reason why his heuristics is to take