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Ideological Symbols

Hamilton College

Previous studies of citizens' understanding and use of the concepts or symbols of liberalism and conservatism have found that most people do not have coherent, constrained ideologically liberal or conservative belief systems, but are able to place themselves relatively accurately on a liberal-conservative scale. Furthermore, their feelings of like or dislike toward liberals and/ or conservatives help them to sort out the world of politics. A series of in-depth interviews with 26 randomly chosen people show that there are two different ways that people relate to these concepts, a policy or a stylistic orientation. Education and political interest seem to affect which type of orientation one has, with better educated and more interested citizens developing policy orientations, but either type of orientation can lead to the use of these symbols as evaluative tools. Recognizing the different ways in which people relate to these common political symbols can improve our ability to understand the ways in which the public thinks about politics.

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