Contextual Effects and Support for Liberalism: A Comparative Analysis

This dissertation examines how variation in political freedom shapes individuals’ liberal attitudes and challenges existing explanations on value change. I begin by demonstrating that mainland China does not follow the path anticipated by Inglehart’s popular theory of value change, which expects protracted economic development to result in growing liberalism (Chapter 2). Many societies sharing similar economic and cultural backgrounds (such as Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan) have successfully embraced liberal values. I argue that it is necessary to consider a neglected contextual factor—level of political freedom—to explain the variation. I validate this argument by comparing a wide range of societies with different economic, cultural and political contexts in Chapter 3. My analysis shows that countries with different levels of political freedom exhibit markedly different patterns of value change. Specifically, while members of politically free societies largely follow the pattern sketched by Inglehart, relatively well-educated and well- to-do people in politically unfree societies experience little value change or even express growing conservativism (compared to other demographic groups) as their societies develop economically. To explain this finding, I suggest that political regimes, especially non-free regimes manipulate cultural institutions, including the educational system, to impede value liberalization. To investigate this process, Chapter 4 compares educational reform and value change in Taiwan and mainland China since the late 1940s. These two societies share economic and cultural backgrounds but have radically different political systems. My analysis finds that the value change mechanisms in the two societies differ greatly from each other. In sum, this dissertation demonstrates that political context is critically important in shaping individual value orientations. This argument adds to existing literature on how democratic values provoke democratization by emphasizing the other side of the story: how regimes, especially non- democratic ones, actively prevent value liberalization. The educational system is an important medium through which a political system promotes its preferred ideology. The main policy implication of this dissertation is that economic growth is insufficient to generate liberal values. Political freedom is a critical prerequisite for successful democratization and a healthy civil society.Ph.D