The Effect of Economic Change and Experience on Political Behavior

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Session Description

The field of political economy is rooted in the recognition that humans create economies. Economies are a function of human choice. What is less well understood is how the economic conditions that those choices produce in turn affect political behavior. This roundtable will engage scholars in a conversation on that topic. Our purpose is to bring attention to the blossoming field of American political economy, and spark ideas for future work in this area. Cramer will facilitate the discussion, which will center on consideration of what we know about whether and how economic change influences political behavior, and what we know about the relationship between economic experience more generally and political behavior.

We will dive into what we know about the mechanisms through which these effects and relationships happen. One mechanism appears to be the influence of economic experience on moral judgments. The participants will share what they know about how economic change and experience influence moral assessments such as fairness, deservingness, justice and individual worth. They will also consider how those assessments are in turn related to political preferences.

Another mechanism through which economic experience appears to influence political behavior is through value choices. We will discuss what we know about how this works (how does economic experience influence value choices, and how are those in turn related to political preferences?), and in particular discuss whether and how economic experience is connected to authoritarian values.

Throughout our conversation we will also consider how inequalities related to race, gender, immigration status, religion, region and other social divides and categories are intertwined in these relationships. We will also consider what we know about the way political elites, social policies, and civic and political organizations including unions structure these perceptions, and the political action and engagement that does or does not result.

The conversation will build into a consideration of identifying what are the important questions and data collection efforts that ought to be pursued.

Sub Unit

• Division 61: American Political Economy

Chair

• Katherine J Cramer University of Wisconsin, Madison

Presenters

• Charlotte Cavaille For School of Public Policy

• John Stephen Ahlquist University of California, San Diego

• Yotam Margalit Tel Aviv University

• Kenneth F. Scheve Yale University

• Jacob S. Hacker Yale University