Ethics and Integrity: Political Attitudes

Political attitudes define the attitude of a person towards politicians, political parties or political ideologies. The political attitude may be different of an apolitical person from political person.

Political Attitude is the way of thinking in terms of political gains and losses. It is belief and action system that decides a action fruitfulness based on electoral gains. Political attitude on positive side can lead to showing zero tolerance toward corruption, pro-poor, welfare for weaker sections, listening to public grievances, but on negative side political attitude can take shape of regionalism, communalising public to polarise them during election.

Politics and Morality

Morality is an individual characteristic and determines his or her actions. Politics on the other hand belong to the public and it is the collective opinion of the public which determines the public policy. It is these policies which ultimately affect public opinion. It is the morality which ultimately underlies all discussions of public policy. Areas which were hitherto morally elusive like foreign affairs, health care, economics, etc. have now joined the traditional moral flash points like abortion, biological research etc.

• Contributions of morality in politics can be extrapolated to ancient beginnings of government. Many rulers of the past established their authority based on the personal charisma, ability, charity etc. All these qualities were considered essential by people to be wise and just. Morality played a vital role in politics of antiquity.
• Moral convictions lead to correct predictions of political engagement. It is the people’s attitudes about the political candidates which reflect their strong moral convictions in their voting patterns.
• Moral convictions also determine the level of political activism of individuals.
• Morality’s role in modern politics has evolved as morality itself has evolved. Modern politics has definitely put the role of morality under scan and latter has become subordinate to social and economic forces.

Morality as a Modern Political Divide

• Morality at the centre of current political debates is more social than personal and its considerations are manifested in many social issues like abortion, gay rights, scientific research, health-care etc.
• Morality also provides a known frame which allows all political arguments and concepts to be learnt and understood. This stands in contrast to all social and economic forces which need specialist analysis. Such political arguments are open to all interpretations and misinterpretations. Democracy functions well only if there is a healthy divide of opinions. However, the morality debates in current times lead to excessive conflict which makes it extremely difficult to give rise to and implement sustainable policy solutions. Politics dominated by morality, deal with socio-behavioural norms and moral principles.

Factors affecting Political Attitude

There is a multitude of factors that affect the political attitudes. Some of these are enumerated below:

Religion

Religion is one of the strongest factors that shape a person’s moral conviction. Killing cow for Hindus is a sin and that defines the political attitude of a devout Hindu. Same sex marriage is forbid in Christianity and thus a devout Christian will oppose such marriage.

Age

While younger people are more liberal / radical; older people are more conservative. Any political change is generally welcome by young and this is one example of how it affects the political attitudes.

Economic Status

Generally, poor align with communist or socialist political ideology, while rich align with capitalism and free market economic policy.

Residence

Local problems always shape the political attitudes of the people. This is one of the reasons that regional parties do good in state elections.

Family / Gender

Family is another strong factors that shapes the political attitude. Generally, children inherit their attitude from their parents. The environment in family helps build up of their political attitude. Similarly, gender also plays role in shaping the political attitude. Females generally favour a government which promises savings in their household budget.

Race/ Caste/ Society

Racism is one of the most important factors that shapes political attitudes in west. In India, political attitude is heavily influenced by caste factor.

Education

The education, particularly curriculum plays an important role in getting the attitude developed. Most of us have been taught in schools that India is oldest civilization. This may not be correct but little importance is given to Mesopotamia and Middle East. Similarly, most of us were never taught about History of China during our schooling. The world history curricula of the schools in India  has deliberately omitted China’s history from the syllabus. At the same time, schools in China teach their kids about greatness of Mao’s political ideology. It’s impression is so deep on their political attitude that most of them don’t understand how democracy works.

Media / Social Media

Media plays an important role in shaping our political attitudes. Apart from mainstream media, today, New media provides cheaper and easier ways to influence people’s political attitudes. New media includes Internet- and digital-based forms of mass communication, including social media. Many forms of new media have already influenced people to vote, volunteer and give money. For example, the American Red Cross used Twitter to raise a record-breaking $8 million dollar plus in relief efforts after the 2010 Haiti earthquake. Similarly, the rise of Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi was much due to influence rendered by media and social media on political attitude of the people.

The convenience of new media is the main reason it plays an important role in shaping today’s political attitudes. New media is wide-ranging, and offers:

• Immediate connection, which allows protests or political gatherings to be scheduled last minute and widely publicized through tweets or Facebook posts.
• News you can choose, i.e. Internet allows voters to look at the sources and stories that appeal specifically to them, while ignoring other points of view.
• Sharing, which allows voters to distribute news themselves, as through ‘retweeting’ or reposting. When news comes from a friend or trusted colleague, voters are more likely to support the same point of view.
• Liking, which allows voters to simply click a ‘thumbs up’ in order to publicize their support of a candidate or issue.
• Donating, which better allows multiple donors to give smaller individual amounts to raise large overall totals.

Summary

Political attitude describes the way you think or feel about our government and related social and economic issues. A political decision is any choice dealing with government affairs, structure or politics. We make our political decisions based on our political attitudes. The media plays an important role in shaping our political attitudes. Television brought candidates and issues closer to the voters, and the voters began placing a higher value on the personality and character of candidates and officials. More recently, new media provides cheaper and easier ways to influence people’s political attitudes. New media includes Internet and digital-based forms of mass communication, including social media, and shapes political attitudes.