Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924752
Tristan Haute, Camille Kelbel, F. Briatte, Giulia Sandri
ABSTRACT This article contributes to the ongoing research effort assessing the effects of the COVID-19 crisis on turnout in the municipal elections held in France in March and June 2020. Holding the election in pandemic times caused turnout to drop significantly, but unevenly so across the electorate. We use both aggregate electoral results at the polling station level and individual-level data drawn from a survey we conducted between June and July 2020. If fear of contagion partly explains voters’ abstention, this article highlights the contradictory effects of the pandemic on the socioeconomic determinants of voter turnout. On the one hand, the variation in turnout levels by age, which usually is quite significant in France, has considerably decreased in 2020. On the other hand, the differences in turnout levels according to the voters’ economic and social status have been reinforced during the pandemic. This analysis of local individual data shows that the health crisis has generated important consequences also on the patterns of social inequalities in political representation.
{"title":"Down with Covid: patterns of electoral turnout in the 2020 French local elections","authors":"Tristan Haute, Camille Kelbel, F. Briatte, Giulia Sandri","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924752","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924752","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article contributes to the ongoing research effort assessing the effects of the COVID-19 crisis on turnout in the municipal elections held in France in March and June 2020. Holding the election in pandemic times caused turnout to drop significantly, but unevenly so across the electorate. We use both aggregate electoral results at the polling station level and individual-level data drawn from a survey we conducted between June and July 2020. If fear of contagion partly explains voters’ abstention, this article highlights the contradictory effects of the pandemic on the socioeconomic determinants of voter turnout. On the one hand, the variation in turnout levels by age, which usually is quite significant in France, has considerably decreased in 2020. On the other hand, the differences in turnout levels according to the voters’ economic and social status have been reinforced during the pandemic. This analysis of local individual data shows that the health crisis has generated important consequences also on the patterns of social inequalities in political representation.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"4 1","pages":"69 - 81"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"76110338","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924735
Jakob Ohme, M. Hameleers, Anna Brosius, T. G. van der Meer
ABSTRACT In a global crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world are dependent on voluntary support of their citizens. Based on a four-wave panel survey conducted in the Netherlands between April and July 2020 (n = 1742), this study investigates the development of citizens’ engagement in prosocial political activities and what motivates such acts of political participation. With previous research indicating strong relationships between news as well as social media use and political participation, we test whether these types of information consumption drive participation over time. The spread of misinformation during the COVID-19 crisis, however, was described as an “infodemic”. The study therefore explores how holding misinformation beliefs directly and indirectly affects participation in COVID-19 related activities.
{"title":"Attenuating the crisis: the relationship between media use, prosocial political participation, and holding misinformation beliefs during the COVID-19 pandemic","authors":"Jakob Ohme, M. Hameleers, Anna Brosius, T. G. van der Meer","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924735","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924735","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT In a global crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world are dependent on voluntary support of their citizens. Based on a four-wave panel survey conducted in the Netherlands between April and July 2020 (n = 1742), this study investigates the development of citizens’ engagement in prosocial political activities and what motivates such acts of political participation. With previous research indicating strong relationships between news as well as social media use and political participation, we test whether these types of information consumption drive participation over time. The spread of misinformation during the COVID-19 crisis, however, was described as an “infodemic”. The study therefore explores how holding misinformation beliefs directly and indirectly affects participation in COVID-19 related activities.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"33 1","pages":"285 - 298"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"76341071","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924745
B. Dulani, Adam S. Harris, Ellen Lust, Karen E. Ferree, Kristen Kao, Cecilia Ahsan Jansson, E. Metheney
ABSTRACT In June 2020, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, Malawians went to the polls and voted to replace the incumbent government. Much like other natural disasters, the Covid-19 pandemic and accompanying economic and political shocks had the potential to shake voters’ confidence in the government, reduce turnout, and/or reduce support for the incumbent if voters associated them with the ills of the pandemic. In this paper, we examine the extent to which the Coronavirus pandemic influenced Malawi’s 2020 elections. We consider how fear of infection and economic distress affected citizens’ trust and confidence in President Mutharika’s government, their willingness to turn out to vote, and their choices at the polls using data collected pre- and post-Covid. We find that fears about the virus and its economic impact did influence trust and confidence in the government to handle Covid but had little to no effect on either abstention or vote choice.
{"title":"Elections in the time of covid-19: the triple crises around Malawi’s 2020 presidential elections","authors":"B. Dulani, Adam S. Harris, Ellen Lust, Karen E. Ferree, Kristen Kao, Cecilia Ahsan Jansson, E. Metheney","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924745","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924745","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT In June 2020, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, Malawians went to the polls and voted to replace the incumbent government. Much like other natural disasters, the Covid-19 pandemic and accompanying economic and political shocks had the potential to shake voters’ confidence in the government, reduce turnout, and/or reduce support for the incumbent if voters associated them with the ills of the pandemic. In this paper, we examine the extent to which the Coronavirus pandemic influenced Malawi’s 2020 elections. We consider how fear of infection and economic distress affected citizens’ trust and confidence in President Mutharika’s government, their willingness to turn out to vote, and their choices at the polls using data collected pre- and post-Covid. We find that fears about the virus and its economic impact did influence trust and confidence in the government to handle Covid but had little to no effect on either abstention or vote choice.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"11 1","pages":"56 - 68"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89233060","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924740
Natalia Aruguete, Ernesto Calvo, Francisco Cantú, S. Ley, Carlos Scartascini, Tiago Ventura
ABSTRACT We present the results of a survey experiment designed to evaluate the effects of social media exposure on perceptions of personal health and job risks during the COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico. Our framing experiment treats respondents to positive and negative partisan messages from high-level politicians. Descriptive findings show divergent evaluations of how the government is addressing the crisis by supporters of the government and opposition parties. Results show that respondents are sensitive to negative frames regardless of the political color of the messenger. Further, supporters of the incumbent are more likely to deflect government’s responsibility when treated with a negative frame by a politician from the opposition.
{"title":"Partisan cues and perceived risks: The effect of partisan social media frames during the COVID-19 crisis in Mexico","authors":"Natalia Aruguete, Ernesto Calvo, Francisco Cantú, S. Ley, Carlos Scartascini, Tiago Ventura","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924740","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924740","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT We present the results of a survey experiment designed to evaluate the effects of social media exposure on perceptions of personal health and job risks during the COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico. Our framing experiment treats respondents to positive and negative partisan messages from high-level politicians. Descriptive findings show divergent evaluations of how the government is addressing the crisis by supporters of the government and opposition parties. Results show that respondents are sensitive to negative frames regardless of the political color of the messenger. Further, supporters of the incumbent are more likely to deflect government’s responsibility when treated with a negative frame by a politician from the opposition.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"31 1","pages":"82 - 95"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73685337","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924731
Taka-aki Asano, Tomoki Kaneko, Shoko Omori, Shusuke Takamiya, M. Taniguchi
ABSTRACT How do the predictable COVID-19-related medical and economic crises affect public opinion? To answer this question, we analyze a nationwide random sampling survey (n = 2053 respondents) coinciding with the period from the beginning of the outbreak of COVID-19 to its peak. This scale and timing enable us to trace a shift in public opinion. We find that the levels of public support for big government had increased before the spread of COVID-19. Furthermore, the results show that with the sudden growth of patients, people predicted a future economic crisis and thus demanded the government to implement economic stimulus measures to reduce damage. Our findings imply that public opinion is formed earlier than crises actually materialize.
{"title":"Predictable crises shape public opinion: evidence from the COVID-19 natural experiment","authors":"Taka-aki Asano, Tomoki Kaneko, Shoko Omori, Shusuke Takamiya, M. Taniguchi","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924731","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924731","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT How do the predictable COVID-19-related medical and economic crises affect public opinion? To answer this question, we analyze a nationwide random sampling survey (n = 2053 respondents) coinciding with the period from the beginning of the outbreak of COVID-19 to its peak. This scale and timing enable us to trace a shift in public opinion. We find that the levels of public support for big government had increased before the spread of COVID-19. Furthermore, the results show that with the sudden growth of patients, people predicted a future economic crisis and thus demanded the government to implement economic stimulus measures to reduce damage. Our findings imply that public opinion is formed earlier than crises actually materialize.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"61 1","pages":"311 - 320"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78912644","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924753
Nina Obermeier
ABSTRACT There are growing concerns that the COVID-19 pandemic is strengthening nationalism around the world by fueling discrimination, unilateralism, and economic crises. However, there have been few empirical analyses of the effect of the pandemic on individuals’ level of nationalism. Using evidence from two original surveys conducted in Canada in 2019 and 2020, I show that public support for international economic integration has increased rather than decreased since the outbreak of the pandemic. The survey data point to economic anxiety induced by the pandemic as a key mechanism shaping individuals’ attitudes towards international economic integration. While the existing literature has found that negative economic sentiment depresses support for international economic integration, economic anxiety appears to be positively related to support for integration in the COVID-19 era. My findings therefore run counter to current arguments about the effect of the pandemic and to expectations based on the existing literature. Gaining a better empirical understanding of the relationship between the pandemic and nationalism in public opinion is particularly important at a time when international cooperation is needed to address both COVID-19 and its economic effects.
{"title":"COVID-19, economic anxiety, and support for international economic integration","authors":"Nina Obermeier","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924753","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924753","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT There are growing concerns that the COVID-19 pandemic is strengthening nationalism around the world by fueling discrimination, unilateralism, and economic crises. However, there have been few empirical analyses of the effect of the pandemic on individuals’ level of nationalism. Using evidence from two original surveys conducted in Canada in 2019 and 2020, I show that public support for international economic integration has increased rather than decreased since the outbreak of the pandemic. The survey data point to economic anxiety induced by the pandemic as a key mechanism shaping individuals’ attitudes towards international economic integration. While the existing literature has found that negative economic sentiment depresses support for international economic integration, economic anxiety appears to be positively related to support for integration in the COVID-19 era. My findings therefore run counter to current arguments about the effect of the pandemic and to expectations based on the existing literature. Gaining a better empirical understanding of the relationship between the pandemic and nationalism in public opinion is particularly important at a time when international cooperation is needed to address both COVID-19 and its economic effects.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"8 1","pages":"15 - 25"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82042129","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924742
Bengt Johansson, D. Hopmann, A. Shehata
ABSTRACT The rally-around-the-flag effect describes the tendency of public opinion to become more favourable toward political leaders in times of crises. Political leaders rarely can exchange this initial rally-around-effect into long-term support, however. The central question addressed in this paper is, why political leaders cannot maintain this increase in support over time. Based on three-wave panel data collected during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in Sweden (N = 1716), this paper investigates why political leaders cannot maintain initial popular support in the long run. Empirically, we find that perceptions of how Sweden is affected by the crisis and political ideology are both important drivers to understand the declining government approval following a rally-around-the-flag effect.
{"title":"When the rally-around-the-flag effect disappears, or: when the COVID-19 pandemic becomes “normalized”","authors":"Bengt Johansson, D. Hopmann, A. Shehata","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924742","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924742","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The rally-around-the-flag effect describes the tendency of public opinion to become more favourable toward political leaders in times of crises. Political leaders rarely can exchange this initial rally-around-effect into long-term support, however. The central question addressed in this paper is, why political leaders cannot maintain this increase in support over time. Based on three-wave panel data collected during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in Sweden (N = 1716), this paper investigates why political leaders cannot maintain initial popular support in the long run. Empirically, we find that perceptions of how Sweden is affected by the crisis and political ideology are both important drivers to understand the declining government approval following a rally-around-the-flag effect.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"77 1","pages":"321 - 334"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83891809","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924736
Macarena Ares, Reto Bürgisser, Silja Häusermann
ABSTRACT The COVID-19 crisis presents a unique opportunity to study how public opinion towards the redistributive role of the state reacts to a major economic shock. The pandemic and the measures taken to stop it exposed citizens to both increased fiscal constraint and heightened redistributive capacity: historical drops in GDP (and fiscal revenue) coincided with unprecedented increases in public spending on healthcare provisions and social policy, as well as staggering amounts of financial liquidity provided to hard-hit economic sectors. How did this affect citizens’ attitudes towards redistribution and their assessments of the capacity of the state to intervene? To tackle these questions, we rely on a two-wave panel survey fielded in Germany, Sweden and Spain in late 2018 and June 2020. While preferred levels of redistribution have remained largely stable, our results indicate major shifts and growing ideological polarization around perceptions of welfare state efficiency and capacity, fiscal constraint and political trust. Hence, the COVID-crisis has so far neither led to a left- nor a right-wing shift in citizens' desired level of state intervention, but to an increasingly polarized context of (re)distributive politics, which is likely to imply heightened conflict over economic and social policy in the future.
{"title":"Attitudinal polarization towards the redistributive role of the state in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis","authors":"Macarena Ares, Reto Bürgisser, Silja Häusermann","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924736","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924736","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The COVID-19 crisis presents a unique opportunity to study how public opinion towards the redistributive role of the state reacts to a major economic shock. The pandemic and the measures taken to stop it exposed citizens to both increased fiscal constraint and heightened redistributive capacity: historical drops in GDP (and fiscal revenue) coincided with unprecedented increases in public spending on healthcare provisions and social policy, as well as staggering amounts of financial liquidity provided to hard-hit economic sectors. How did this affect citizens’ attitudes towards redistribution and their assessments of the capacity of the state to intervene? To tackle these questions, we rely on a two-wave panel survey fielded in Germany, Sweden and Spain in late 2018 and June 2020. While preferred levels of redistribution have remained largely stable, our results indicate major shifts and growing ideological polarization around perceptions of welfare state efficiency and capacity, fiscal constraint and political trust. Hence, the COVID-crisis has so far neither led to a left- nor a right-wing shift in citizens' desired level of state intervention, but to an increasingly polarized context of (re)distributive politics, which is likely to imply heightened conflict over economic and social policy in the future.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"33 1","pages":"41 - 55"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"81537376","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924738
Michele Crepaz, G. Arıkan
ABSTRACT The implementation of unprecedented crisis management policies in response to the spread of COVID-19 has attracted the attention of scholars interested in exploring the link between pandemic politics and political trust. However, while the disclosure of information about the pandemic constitutes an important aspect of crisis management policies, the effect of the level of information disclosure on political trust has not yet been investigated. As part of a larger nationally representative survey experiment on the role of transparency on political trust, we collected data from 618 respondents in the Republic of Ireland in May 2020. The pre-registered study manipulated the level of the disclosure of government information about the status of the pandemic (high and low information conditions). We do not find any direct effects of information disclosure treatments on political trust. However, we find that the high information condition significantly increases political trust among individuals with higher levels of prior trust in government, while it leads to a backfiring effect among those with lower levels of prior trust. These findings are relevant for both public opinion and public policy researchers who are interested in the effect of openness on citizen attitudes.
{"title":"Information disclosure and political trust during the COVID-19 crisis: experimental evidence from Ireland","authors":"Michele Crepaz, G. Arıkan","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924738","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924738","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The implementation of unprecedented crisis management policies in response to the spread of COVID-19 has attracted the attention of scholars interested in exploring the link between pandemic politics and political trust. However, while the disclosure of information about the pandemic constitutes an important aspect of crisis management policies, the effect of the level of information disclosure on political trust has not yet been investigated. As part of a larger nationally representative survey experiment on the role of transparency on political trust, we collected data from 618 respondents in the Republic of Ireland in May 2020. The pre-registered study manipulated the level of the disclosure of government information about the status of the pandemic (high and low information conditions). We do not find any direct effects of information disclosure treatments on political trust. However, we find that the high information condition significantly increases political trust among individuals with higher levels of prior trust in government, while it leads to a backfiring effect among those with lower levels of prior trust. These findings are relevant for both public opinion and public policy researchers who are interested in the effect of openness on citizen attitudes.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"11 13 1","pages":"96 - 108"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78398030","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-31DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2021.1924739
L. Brown, L. Horvath, Daniel P. Stevens
ABSTRACT The Covid-19 crisis has been truly worldwide and has unfolded almost simultaneously across the globe. In order to control its spread and alleviate its impact governments have been faced with a range of policy options in terms of containment and closure, ramping up healthcare, and mitigating its economic effects. In this paper, we explore the stringency as well as the speed of policy response as a function of leaders’ personality traits, accounting for party-political orientation. To do this, we construct a text corpus composed of 26 country leaders’ rhetoric on Covid-19 collected from 10 days before the first recorded death in their respective countries until 90 days after, and use a pre-trained machine classifier to generate the Big Five personality traits for each leader. We find two general patterns: (1) one around neuroticism, a trait associated with negative stress response, which is associated with leniency in containment and health policy measures; and (2) some evidence that conscientiousness, a trait associated with risk aversion, is associated with quicker policy response. We conclude by suggesting analysis on the sub-national level in order to increase test power, and more work on validation linking our estimates of Big Five to expert ratings of personality.
{"title":"Moonshots or a cautious take-off? How the Big Five leadership traits predict Covid-19 policy response","authors":"L. Brown, L. Horvath, Daniel P. Stevens","doi":"10.1080/17457289.2021.1924739","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17457289.2021.1924739","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The Covid-19 crisis has been truly worldwide and has unfolded almost simultaneously across the globe. In order to control its spread and alleviate its impact governments have been faced with a range of policy options in terms of containment and closure, ramping up healthcare, and mitigating its economic effects. In this paper, we explore the stringency as well as the speed of policy response as a function of leaders’ personality traits, accounting for party-political orientation. To do this, we construct a text corpus composed of 26 country leaders’ rhetoric on Covid-19 collected from 10 days before the first recorded death in their respective countries until 90 days after, and use a pre-trained machine classifier to generate the Big Five personality traits for each leader. We find two general patterns: (1) one around neuroticism, a trait associated with negative stress response, which is associated with leniency in containment and health policy measures; and (2) some evidence that conscientiousness, a trait associated with risk aversion, is associated with quicker policy response. We conclude by suggesting analysis on the sub-national level in order to increase test power, and more work on validation linking our estimates of Big Five to expert ratings of personality.","PeriodicalId":46791,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties","volume":"50 1","pages":"335 - 347"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2021-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83550050","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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