Surveys, Values, and Democracies: Models from Welzel, Dalton, and Shin

Abstract

This short article provides a snapshot of how scholars in the field of public opinion, civic culture, and value change have employed survey data from transnational databases such as the World Values Survey and Global Barometer Surveys to investigate the linkage between civic values operationalized as "postmaterialist," "emancipative" or "assertive" values and attitudes toward governance and regime. This article also takes a study that taps the "cognitive incapacity" for East Asian respondents to distinguish and understand liberal democracy to shed light on the ongoing debates around the "Asian values thesis."

Keywords: Public Opinion, Civic Culture, Asian Values Thesis