Are Political Staffers out of Touch with Grassroots Party Members? Assessing Congruence between Professionals and Volunteers.
This article examines whether political professionalization causes attitudinal incongruence within political parties. In this first of a kind study, the internal opinion structure of five Belgian political parties based in Flanders is analysed by comparing the political attitudes of staffers and par...
| Published in: | Political Studies Vol. 72; no. 1; pp. 303 - 322 |
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| Format: | Article |
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Sage Publications Inc.
Feb2024
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=175415887&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 175415887 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00323217 PSZ jtl: Political Studies issn: 00323217 maglogo: Y pubinfo: dt: Feb2024 vid: 72 iid: 1 pid: 344 pub: Sage Publications Inc. artinfo: ui: 175415887 10.1177/00323217221102700 ppf: 303 ppct: 19 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T db: hlh ui: 175415887 – @attributes: type: P db: hlh ui: 175415887 tig: atl: Are Political Staffers out of Touch with Grassroots Party Members? Assessing Congruence between Professionals and Volunteers. aug: au: Moens, Pieter affil: Department of Political Science, Ghent University, Gent, Belgium su: Flanders Professionalization Political parties Political attitudes Volunteers sug: subj: Professionalization Political parties Political attitudes Volunteers Flanders Political Organizations Marketing Research and Public Opinion Polling keyword: attitudinal congruence party members political professionalization political staff attitudinal congruence party members political professionalization political staff ab: This article examines whether political professionalization causes attitudinal incongruence within political parties. In this first of a kind study, the internal opinion structure of five Belgian political parties based in Flanders is analysed by comparing the political attitudes of staffers and party members. The analysis combines original survey data collected among the staff of five Belgian political parties based in Flanders (N = 560) and survey data collected among their party members by the MAPP project (N = 10,022). The results demonstrate that staffers are mostly congruent with party members, with a few remarkable exceptions. As anticipated by my reinterpretation of cleavage theory, incongruences are more prevalent among mainstream parties and mostly appear on issues concerning globalization. This cosmopolitan bias among staffers is primarily driven by an educational and generational divide with party members. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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