- •Sociology What is Sociology?
- •A Sociological Consciousness
- •The Sociological Challenge
- •Social Structure
- •The Nature of Social Structure
- •The Nature of Roles
- •Role Set
- •Role Strain
- •Role Taking and Role Making
- •Embracing the Role
- •Statuses
- •The Nature of Statuses
- •Ascribed and Achieved Statuses
- •Master Statuses
- •Groups: The Sociological Subject
- •Primary and Secondary Groups
- •Social Structure and Change
- •Socialization
- •Human Development: Nature and Nurture
- •Spheres of socialization
- •The Family
- •Schooling
- •Peer Groups
- •The Mass Media
- •Public Opinion
- •Political behavior
- •Political Beliefs
- •Belief Systems
- •Political Culture
- •Political Actions
- •Individual political actions Modes of Political Activity
- •Group political actions
- •The people and democracy
- •The American “Voter”
- •Concepts and theories of stratification
- •Chapter Preview
- •Conceptions of social class
- •Marx's concept of class
- •The Bourgeoisie and the Proletariat
- •Class Consciousness and Conflict
- •The Economic Dimension of Class
- •Weber's three dimensions of stratification
- •Property
- •Prestige
- •The functionalist theory of stratification
- •Replaceability
- •Social classes in the united states
- •The Upper Class
- •Social Mobility: Myth and Reality
- •Stratification and Mobility in Recent Decades
- •Age, gender, household composition, and poverty?
- •Race, ethnicity, and poverty
- •Family structure and characteristics
- •Marriage patterns
- •Power and authority in families
- •Perspectives on families
- •Functionalist perspectives
- •New Patterns and Pressure Points
- •Employed Mothers
- •Stepfamilies
- •Is the Family Endangered or Merely Changing?
- •Religion
- •Elements of religion
- •Types of religious organizations
- •The Functions of Religion
- •Religion in the United States
- •Religion in the united states Religious Affiliation
- •Religiosity
- •Correlates of Religious Affiliation
Belief Systems
Beyond the identification of specific beliefs of individuals, other interesting analyses can focus on the array of political beliefs held by an individual. The concept of belief system is often used to refer to the configuration of an individual’s political orientations across political issues. A related concept used by political psychologists is an individual’s opinion schema. This is a network of cognitive, affective, and evaluative orientations that serves as a basic framework guiding a person as he processes political information in order to establish an opinion on a particular subject (Hastie 1986).
Political Culture
Some analysts attempt to identify broadly shared patterns of political orientations that characterize a large group of individuals. The objective is to develop generalizations about the political culture of the group. Political culture is normally defined as the configuration of a particular people’s political orientations – that is, as the belief system of many individuals. For this reason, political culture is not precisely a topic in micropolitics, but it is examined here because it is embedded in individual-level analyses. (Although some research on political culture includes not only beliefs but also patterns of political action, this discussion will emphasize political beliefs.)
Most commonly, it is the political culture of a country or of a major (ethnic or religious) community within a country that has been studied. The composition of the group that is studied depends on the interests of the researcher. It might be the people of a geographic community (e.g., Londoners, English, British, Europeans) or of a community of shared identity (e.g., Sikhs in the Indian state of Punjab, Sikhs in the Indian subcontinent, all Sikhs in the world) or of a community of shared meaning (e.g., French Canadians, all French-speaking peoples).
Political Actions
Ultimately, the more important issues regarding the individual in politics might be questions about what people do politically, not merely what they think. In the flag-burning incident at the beginning of Chapter 2, for example, the most relevant question from the perspective of the political world is, What did you do when you saw the woman?
Broadly, political participation is the term that can be applied to all of the political actions by individuals and groups. The explicit objective of most political participation is to influence the actions or selection of political rulers (Nelson 1987:104). What is the range of behaviors that a person might undertake in the political world? At one extreme are people who are obsessed with politics, see polit ical implications in most of life's actions, are constantly involved in political discussion and action, and want to make political decisions for others. At the other extreme are people who have absolutely no interest in politics, pay no attention to political phenomena, and engage in no politically relevant actions. (In some instances, such as not voting in an election, not doing something can also be a type of political participation.)