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Do people like to discuss politics? A study of citizens’ political talk culture

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Manuel Neumann explores citizens’ attitudes toward everyday political talk in deliberative democracy. Findings reveal limited appreciation for discussing politics, influenced by interest, conflict orientations, and social ties.

Image courtesy of interviewee. December 7, 2023

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This video video discusses the concept of deliberative democracy, which emphasizes the importance of deliberation over traditional support/opposition aggregation in democratic governance. Proponents advocate for a political process that includes relevant voices, mutual respect, and consensus-building to enhance legitimacy and decision-making quality.

There has been significant debate since the 1990s about how to practically implement deliberative democracy, particularly regarding the inclusion of everyday citizens in political discussions. While empirical studies show that citizens often do not engage in political conversations as envisioned in the theoretical model, there remains a normative argument for their inclusion.

The authors of the text investigate the attitudes towards political conversation, suggesting that these attitudes are influenced by political dispositions (interest and party identification), social dispositions (need for belonging, social trust), and the context of interactions (different conversation partners and disagreement levels). Using data from a study in Mannheim, Germany, they find that only about one-third of respondents enjoy discussing politics in unconditional settings, with preferences being stronger among close ties than acquaintances.

Furthermore, negative attitudes toward political discussions increase with the introduction of disagreement. While political interest is a key factor in fostering positive attitudes, social dispositions play a significant role. Overall, the findings indicate that most people prefer to avoid political discussions, underscoring the need to view political conversations as social relationships rather than solely political acts. Consequently, as deliberative democracy relies on citizen engagement, it must consider that many citizens may not be inclined to participate actively in political discussions.

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00:00.000 --> 00:03.125
Deliberative democracy is like a theoretical idea

00:03.185 --> 00:06.685
of democracy that focuses on improving democratic

00:06.685 --> 00:10.285
governance, not so much through the, aggregating

00:10.285 --> 00:11.405
of like, support

00:11.405 --> 00:14.085
and opposition, like in traditional models

00:14.185 --> 00:15.205
of liberal democracy,

00:15.945 --> 00:17.645
but through deliberation

00:17.645 --> 00:19.845
of the political issues in question.

00:20.745 --> 00:22.725
So this means proponents of deliberative,

00:22.925 --> 00:26.205
deliberative democracy stretch the importance

00:26.385 --> 00:29.365
of the consensus making based on the inclusion

00:29.425 --> 00:30.885
of our relevant voices

00:31.705 --> 00:34.565
and a deliberative process that follows certain

00:35.105 --> 00:37.805
ideals like the inclusion of our relevant voices,

00:38.235 --> 00:40.765
like respecting each other, consensus, finding

00:41.385 --> 00:44.125
to gain in the end kind of like a better decision making

00:44.545 --> 00:48.565
and more legitimacy in the outcomes in political,

00:48.825 --> 00:49.885
in the democratic world.

00:50.305 --> 00:52.725
So the thing is with everyday political target is

00:52.725 --> 00:56.405
that from the beginning on, like

00:56.525 --> 00:58.565
with basically all the theoretical ideas,

00:59.385 --> 01:01.005
it was a big discussion of

01:01.105 --> 01:03.165
how can you even implement such an idea?

01:03.345 --> 01:04.445
Is it really practical?

01:05.345 --> 01:08.285
And there was a big discussion starting probably like in the

01:08.485 --> 01:10.765
nineties, especially with, the influence,

01:10.765 --> 01:15.425
influential article by Gene's mans bridge with a question

01:15.425 --> 01:16.585
of should we

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or have, do we have to take into consideration everyday

01:21.345 --> 01:22.865
citizens political con

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conversations in this deliberative democracy framework?

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While the two tension,

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or the one tension point here is that it really falls short

01:32.765 --> 01:36.385
of all these ideals that the theoretical model proposes

01:36.535 --> 01:39.665
that is needed for such a fruitful discussion

01:39.665 --> 01:40.865
for the deliberation.

01:41.605 --> 01:43.705
On the other hand, you kind of have

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to include citizens if you want to talk about

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deliberative democracy being really democratic.

01:51.035 --> 01:55.915
So basically the empirical literature took a

01:55.915 --> 01:57.035
glance at all of this

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and showed like, yeah, it is actually the case

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that those conversations fall short of those ideals,

02:03.695 --> 02:06.275
but the normative argument still stands

02:06.295 --> 02:10.705
and still discuss today that, well, it falls short,

02:10.885 --> 02:13.185
but we still have to include it somehow.

02:13.965 --> 02:17.385
Our starting point that we took aside all those practical

02:17.385 --> 02:21.385
problems and said like, well, if we have to include citizens

02:21.445 --> 02:23.985
and we think we should, if we want to talk about democracy,

02:24.815 --> 02:27.345
then we have to think about, well,

02:27.375 --> 02:31.585
does the political culture provide a congruent,

02:31.825 --> 02:35.505
a congruent ground for anything, for any establishment

02:35.525 --> 02:36.905
of deliberative democracy?

02:38.525 --> 02:42.025
So we thought about not looking in the actual behavior

02:42.165 --> 02:43.305
as many did before us,

02:43.725 --> 02:47.585
but into the attitudes to, towards the behavior in question

02:47.585 --> 02:49.505
that is needed for deliberative democracy.

02:50.045 --> 02:52.145
And that is political conversation making.

02:53.125 --> 02:55.065
So we took the idea

02:55.205 --> 02:58.795
or we took the concept of attitudes from

02:59.155 --> 03:02.365
Fish vines and ISIS's expectancy values, model

03:02.715 --> 03:03.965
that basically pos

03:03.965 --> 03:07.925
that political attitudes towards a certain behavior is a

03:07.925 --> 03:09.605
result of their negative

03:09.605 --> 03:12.725
or positive appraisal of that, behavior.

03:13.345 --> 03:14.765
And importantly, that highlights

03:15.115 --> 03:17.645
that there are certain backgrounds to this,

03:17.825 --> 03:18.965
to these attitudes,

03:19.185 --> 03:21.245
and that they are also context dependent.

03:22.365 --> 03:25.985
So for us, we looked at three different dimensions

03:26.055 --> 03:30.705
that might influence the variety of, of attitudes.

03:31.075 --> 03:34.225
First we looked at political dispositions, we looked at

03:34.805 --> 03:36.265
social disposition second,

03:36.845 --> 03:39.385
and in the end also at the context in which these,

03:39.565 --> 03:41.105
in which the behavior takes place,

03:41.365 --> 03:42.785
the political conversations.

03:43.725 --> 03:47.425
So for the political dispositions, the hypothesis

03:47.985 --> 03:51.305
hypothesis is pretty, straightforward that we expect

03:51.305 --> 03:55.225
that people to be engaged in politics, ask to, like,

03:55.225 --> 03:57.345
to talk about politics like people

03:57.345 --> 03:58.665
who are politically interested

03:58.885 --> 04:00.985
or who have a strong party ident,

04:01.205 --> 04:02.745
identification and so on.

04:03.925 --> 04:07.665
But political talk is not just like goal oriented.

04:07.885 --> 04:11.025
People do not really are, we know from the literature so far

04:11.025 --> 04:15.105
that people do not just engage in political talk

04:15.105 --> 04:18.505
because it's, a political matter, but

04:18.505 --> 04:20.425
because it's a social environment,

04:20.805 --> 04:22.665
it happens in relationships

04:23.405 --> 04:28.185
and people do have to not all, not just win arguments

04:28.205 --> 04:30.745
or fear of losing arguments,

04:30.745 --> 04:34.465
but they have to manage their social relationships, how

04:34.465 --> 04:37.505
to conduct themselves, how they want to be presented,

04:37.525 --> 04:40.865
how they want to, well manage

04:41.205 --> 04:44.545
how good a standing they have with the person they talk to.

04:45.685 --> 04:50.025
So we looked at for additional like social, dispositions

04:50.025 --> 04:52.825
that we thought are important, for example, for example,

04:52.825 --> 04:55.065
psychological needs like need to belong,

04:55.405 --> 04:59.385
but also conflict orientations, social trust

04:59.845 --> 05:01.825
and people's perceived competence

05:01.825 --> 05:03.985
to even discuss political issues.

05:05.125 --> 05:09.265
And eventually we also looked at the different, contexts

05:09.495 --> 05:13.745
that political talk can, be conducted in.

05:14.125 --> 05:18.105
And that is in different conversations with different,

05:18.745 --> 05:20.105
conversation partners.

05:20.165 --> 05:21.465
For example, family members

05:21.605 --> 05:24.225
and friends, like close ties that we know very well

05:24.565 --> 05:27.985
and acquaintances so weer ties that we don't know that well.

05:28.645 --> 05:32.785
And also a second dimension, of different levels

05:33.125 --> 05:36.345
of disagreement, whether the conversation,

05:36.445 --> 05:39.545
is rather in an unconditional scenario

05:39.965 --> 05:42.945
or whether people experienced disagreement in it.

05:43.125 --> 05:46.265
So for our analysis, we made use of data

05:46.375 --> 05:49.465
that was collected in our so-called Conversations

05:49.465 --> 05:50.545
of Democracy Project.

05:51.325 --> 05:54.185
And the main data set here is a face-to-face survey of

05:54.405 --> 05:58.645
around 1,600 respondents from the mid-sized city

05:58.985 --> 06:03.205
of Mannheim in Germany, which is, which provides a lot

06:03.205 --> 06:05.685
of variation both in terms of,

06:06.515 --> 06:08.605
like socioeconomic backgrounds

06:08.945 --> 06:12.815
and political backgrounds, these political

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or political conversation attitudes of citizens.

06:17.115 --> 06:20.455
We ask them separate questions about how much they like

06:20.475 --> 06:23.735
or dislike to talk with their peers, with their social ties,

06:23.735 --> 06:26.615
like family members and friends and also acquaintances.

06:26.995 --> 06:29.295
And then in separate questions also how they would like

06:29.315 --> 06:32.655
or dislike to talk to them when disagreement is introduced

06:32.765 --> 06:34.135
into this conversation.

06:35.315 --> 06:38.415
So interestingly, even in the unconditional settings,

06:38.965 --> 06:41.895
only a minority of respondents indicated that they like

06:41.895 --> 06:44.895
to talk about politics only around a third of respondents.

06:44.895 --> 06:49.255
So, so most people's four out of 10 are rather indifferent

06:50.225 --> 06:52.325
and to anticipate the results, a little

06:53.005 --> 06:55.925
attitudes towards talk with family members and friends.

06:56.225 --> 06:59.805
So close ties were much more positively viewed than

07:00.085 --> 07:02.885
acquaintances with, conversations with acquaintances.

07:03.545 --> 07:06.845
And also attitudes become much more negative when

07:07.165 --> 07:09.645
disagreement inter is introduced into the scenarios.

07:11.145 --> 07:14.205
So while there is not a majority in opposition towards

07:14.315 --> 07:17.005
political, conversations,

07:17.925 --> 07:20.805
negative attitudes become much more prevalent when we talk

07:20.805 --> 07:21.965
about those conversations

07:21.995 --> 07:24.005
that we value most in the framework

07:24.005 --> 07:25.125
of deliberative democracy.

07:25.305 --> 07:28.645
And those are the discussions in like semi-public spaces

07:29.055 --> 07:33.965
where people engage with, other people they don't know

07:33.965 --> 07:37.565
that get, that well who might hold other views

07:37.705 --> 07:41.125
or who have a high probability to hold other views.

07:41.905 --> 07:44.245
So when it comes to explaining this variation,

07:44.265 --> 07:47.005
we found on the side of the political dimension

07:47.275 --> 07:51.045
that it is primarily political interest that drives,

07:51.325 --> 07:53.885
positives attitudes towards political talk.

07:55.015 --> 07:56.865
Much more interesting though is

07:56.865 --> 08:00.905
that the social attitudes were well at least as strong,

08:00.925 --> 08:02.185
if not stronger

08:02.285 --> 08:05.585
and consistently, important for

08:06.425 --> 08:07.865
positive political attitudes.

08:09.305 --> 08:12.365
As mentioned before, students also like to talk more

08:12.755 --> 08:15.005
with their strong ties than their weak ties.

08:15.265 --> 08:19.905
And also when the conversations involved, involve,

08:20.035 --> 08:22.225
don't involve necessarily disagreement.

08:22.685 --> 08:27.265
And interestingly, those three dimensions interact also in a

08:27.265 --> 08:29.465
network of conditional effects.

08:30.325 --> 08:34.705
So especially for political in interest, it fosters,

08:35.145 --> 08:37.865
positive political, attitudes towards political talk,

08:38.075 --> 08:40.825
especially when people are already conflict seeking

08:41.245 --> 08:44.385
or when they feel confident to discuss political matters.

08:45.545 --> 08:49.545
Social trust affects primarily with whom we like to talk,

08:49.565 --> 08:52.705
but not so much how much disagreement is involved.

08:53.235 --> 08:57.205
While, the conflict orientations unsurprisingly play a

08:57.205 --> 08:58.445
much more,

08:58.555 --> 09:02.605
substantive role in when the disagreement is involved than

09:02.755 --> 09:04.445
with whom we talk in general.

09:05.315 --> 09:07.885
This leaves us with a picture that all in all people

09:08.075 --> 09:09.885
that like talking about politics

09:10.065 --> 09:11.565
are actually in the minority.

09:12.465 --> 09:14.525
We also show that while political,

09:14.525 --> 09:17.805
political interest is a strong driver of positive attitudes,

09:18.225 --> 09:19.605
it has social dispositions

09:19.605 --> 09:22.925
that play the much more important also conditional role.

09:23.675 --> 09:25.965
This speaks to the increasing catalog of findings

09:25.965 --> 09:29.485
that urge us to understand political conversations much less

09:29.665 --> 09:34.445
as a political act, but more as a social relationship thing.

09:35.675 --> 09:39.615
So positive appraisals of political talk, including

09:40.625 --> 09:42.635
like driven by political interest,

09:43.095 --> 09:47.315
is more like a Fairweather phenomenon where people like

09:47.315 --> 09:49.995
to have first comfortable levels of disagreement,

09:50.865 --> 09:53.395
perceived like I have a need

09:53.695 --> 09:56.555
to perceive their own competence to discuss politics

09:56.815 --> 09:58.955
and need a trusting and safe environment

09:59.175 --> 10:02.075
before those really interesting,

10:02.075 --> 10:04.595
politically interesting variables like political interest,

10:04.975 --> 10:06.955
have their effect.

10:07.655 --> 10:09.115
So whenever we talk about

10:09.625 --> 10:11.595
citizen's role in deliberative democracy,

10:12.355 --> 10:14.675
I think about conversations centered,

10:14.675 --> 10:15.995
democratic innovations

10:16.225 --> 10:19.395
that rely on active citizens engagement.

10:19.815 --> 10:22.835
We just have to keep in mind that there's a possibility

10:22.905 --> 10:24.515
that people are just not into it.

00:00 - Deliberative democracy is like a theoretical idea of democracy that focuses on improving democratic governance, not so much through the, aggregating of like, support and opposition, like in traditional models of liberal democracy,

00:15 - but through deliberation of the political issues in question. So this means proponents of deliberative, deliberative democracy stretch the importance of the consensus making based on the inclusion of our relevant voices and a deliberative process that follows certain ideals like the inclusion of our relevant voices, like respecting each other, consensus, finding to gain in the end kind of like a better decision making

00:44 - and more legitimacy in the outcomes in political, in the democratic world. So the thing is with everyday political target is that from the beginning on, like with basically all the theoretical ideas, it was a big discussion of how can you even implement such an idea? Is it really practical? And there was a big discussion starting probably like in the nineties, especially with, the influence,

01:10 - influential article by Gene's mans bridge with a question of should we or have, do we have to take into consideration everyday citizens political con conversations in this deliberative democracy framework? While the two tension, or the one tension point here is that it really falls short of all these ideals that the theoretical model proposes that is needed for such a fruitful discussion for the deliberation.

01:41 - On the other hand, you kind of have to include citizens if you want to talk about deliberative democracy being really democratic. So basically the empirical literature took a glance at all of this and showed like, yeah, it is actually the case that those conversations fall short of those ideals, but the normative argument still stands and still discuss today that, well, it falls short, but we still have to include it somehow.

02:13 - Our starting point that we took aside all those practical problems and said like, well, if we have to include citizens and we think we should, if we want to talk about democracy, then we have to think about, well, does the political culture provide a congruent, a congruent ground for anything, for any establishment of deliberative democracy? So we thought about not looking in the actual behavior as many did before us, but into the attitudes to, towards the behavior in question

02:47 - that is needed for deliberative democracy. And that is political conversation making. So we took the idea or we took the concept of attitudes from Fish vines and ISIS's expectancy values, model that basically pos that political attitudes towards a certain behavior is a result of their negative or positive appraisal of that, behavior. And importantly, that highlights

03:15 - that there are certain backgrounds to this, to these attitudes, and that they are also context dependent. So for us, we looked at three different dimensions that might influence the variety of, of attitudes. First we looked at political dispositions, we looked at social disposition second, and in the end also at the context in which these, in which the behavior takes place, the political conversations.

03:43 - So for the political dispositions, the hypothesis hypothesis is pretty, straightforward that we expect that people to be engaged in politics, ask to, like, to talk about politics like people who are politically interested or who have a strong party ident, identification and so on. But political talk is not just like goal oriented. People do not really are, we know from the literature so far that people do not just engage in political talk

04:15 - because it's, a political matter, but because it's a social environment, it happens in relationships and people do have to not all, not just win arguments or fear of losing arguments, but they have to manage their social relationships, how to conduct themselves, how they want to be presented, how they want to, well manage how good a standing they have with the person they talk to. So we looked at for additional like social, dispositions

04:50 - that we thought are important, for example, for example, psychological needs like need to belong, but also conflict orientations, social trust and people's perceived competence to even discuss political issues. And eventually we also looked at the different, contexts that political talk can, be conducted in. And that is in different conversations with different, conversation partners. For example, family members

05:21 - and friends, like close ties that we know very well and acquaintances so weer ties that we don't know that well. And also a second dimension, of different levels of disagreement, whether the conversation, is rather in an unconditional scenario or whether people experienced disagreement in it. So for our analysis, we made use of data that was collected in our so-called Conversations of Democracy Project. And the main data set here is a face-to-face survey of

05:54 - around 1,600 respondents from the mid-sized city of Mannheim in Germany, which is, which provides a lot of variation both in terms of, like socioeconomic backgrounds and political backgrounds, these political or political conversation attitudes of citizens. We ask them separate questions about how much they like or dislike to talk with their peers, with their social ties, like family members and friends and also acquaintances. And then in separate questions also how they would like

06:29 - or dislike to talk to them when disagreement is introduced into this conversation. So interestingly, even in the unconditional settings, only a minority of respondents indicated that they like to talk about politics only around a third of respondents. So, so most people's four out of 10 are rather indifferent and to anticipate the results, a little attitudes towards talk with family members and friends. So close ties were much more positively viewed than acquaintances with, conversations with acquaintances.

07:03 - And also attitudes become much more negative when disagreement inter is introduced into the scenarios. So while there is not a majority in opposition towards political, conversations, negative attitudes become much more prevalent when we talk about those conversations that we value most in the framework of deliberative democracy. And those are the discussions in like semi-public spaces where people engage with, other people they don't know

07:33 - that get, that well who might hold other views or who have a high probability to hold other views. So when it comes to explaining this variation, we found on the side of the political dimension that it is primarily political interest that drives, positives attitudes towards political talk. Much more interesting though is that the social attitudes were well at least as strong, if not stronger and consistently, important for

08:06 - positive political attitudes. As mentioned before, students also like to talk more with their strong ties than their weak ties. And also when the conversations involved, involve, don't involve necessarily disagreement. And interestingly, those three dimensions interact also in a network of conditional effects. So especially for political in interest, it fosters, positive political, attitudes towards political talk, especially when people are already conflict seeking

08:41 - or when they feel confident to discuss political matters. Social trust affects primarily with whom we like to talk, but not so much how much disagreement is involved. While, the conflict orientations unsurprisingly play a much more, substantive role in when the disagreement is involved than with whom we talk in general. This leaves us with a picture that all in all people that like talking about politics are actually in the minority.

09:12 - We also show that while political, political interest is a strong driver of positive attitudes, it has social dispositions that play the much more important also conditional role. This speaks to the increasing catalog of findings that urge us to understand political conversations much less as a political act, but more as a social relationship thing. So positive appraisals of political talk, including like driven by political interest, is more like a Fairweather phenomenon where people like

09:47 - to have first comfortable levels of disagreement, perceived like I have a need to perceive their own competence to discuss politics and need a trusting and safe environment before those really interesting, politically interesting variables like political interest, have their effect. So whenever we talk about citizen's role in deliberative democracy, I think about conversations centered,

10:14 - democratic innovations that rely on active citizens engagement. We just have to keep in mind that there's a possibility that people are just not into it.

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