Der demokratische Musterburger als Normalfall? Kognitionspsychologische Einblicke in de black box politischer Meinungsbildung

In: Politische Vierteljahresschrift: PVS : German political science quarterly, Band 47, Heft 1, S. 89-101

Abstract

Democracy allows citizens political autonomy & development. Normative theories often portray homo politicus, a democratic citizen who is politically interested & informed, has structured political preferences & represents these assertively. However, many skeptics doubt that real people correspond to this image. Surveys have shown that most citizens do not have clear attitudes towards political questions, & cannot make use of abstract political concepts such as liberal or conservative in their political thinking. In addition, only a few citizens are well-informed about political issues & rather tend to exploit their right to political apathy. One theoretical approach contends that even though individuals may not have clear political preferences, collectively a society can react to political issues in a sensible manner. Another approach focuses on how individual citizens develop political orientations. This article describes the latter cognition-psychological approach. References. A. Kallioinen