When they go low, we go high? People’s Reactions to Political Corruption depend on Relativity Processes

当他们走低时，我们走高？

• 批准号: 258541679
• 负责人: Professor Dr. Christian Unkelbach, since 10/2019
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Columbia Business School
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Units
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2013-12-31 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/258541679?language=en
• 关键词: When; they; go; low; People

People’s reactions to cases of corruption and other political scandals appear unpredictable. Sometimes, people appear indifferent to the most shameless acts of misconduct by elected representatives, while at other times they suddenly rise up in anger. On the one hand, the perception that a political candidate is not true to earlier words can devastate their odds of winning elections, but some politicians have managed to be elected and re-elected despite decades of corruption charges. Inspired by such seemingly inconsistent observations in democracies across the globe, the objective of Project TP-5 is to demonstrate the central role of relativity and comparison processes to explain people’s reactions to political corruption scandals. It does so in three Work Packages that each focus on one specific type of comparison that is relevant to one specific stage of the evolution of corruption. In WP I we focus on self-politician comparisons. Building on the findings of the First Funding Period, we propose that a moral threat can explain why voters sometimes vote for corrupt political candidates. In WP II we focus on politician-system comparisons. We aim to focus on processes of comparison to explain why hearing about political corruption can lead to political activism among some citizens and political apathy among others. Finally, in Work Package III we focus on system-citizen comparisons. Here we aim to show how hearing about corruption can sour relations between citizens and lead to distrust and selfishness – but can also produce the opposite effects and increase trust and altruism. By demonstrating across all three projects that citizens’ reactions to political corruption are fundamentally flexible, we propose that this project offers a fundamental insight that can help citizens to react to political corruption with a battle-cry to defend democracy, engage in political activism, and support challengers—while maintaining solidarity with their co-citizens.

人们对腐败案件和其他政治丑闻的反应似乎是不可预测的。有时，人们对当选代表最无耻的不当行为漠不关心，而有时他们突然愤怒起来。一方面，认为政治候选人不忠于先前的言论可能会降低他们赢得选举的几率，但一些政治家尽管受到数十年的腐败指控，但仍然成功当选并再次当选。受地球仪民主国家中这种看似不一致的观察的启发，TP-5项目的目标是展示相对性和比较过程在解释人们对政治腐败丑闻的反应方面的核心作用。它分三个工作包进行，每个工作包侧重于与腐败演变的一个特定阶段有关的一种特定类型的比较。在WP I中，我们专注于自我政治家的比较。基于第一个资助期的调查结果，我们提出道德威胁可以解释为什么选民有时会投票给腐败的政治候选人。在WP II中，我们专注于政治制度的比较。我们的目标是集中在比较的过程中，以解释为什么听到政治腐败可以导致一些公民的政治活动和其他人的政治冷漠。最后，在工作包III中，我们重点关注系统-公民比较。在这里，我们的目的是展示如何听到腐败会恶化公民之间的关系，导致不信任和自私-但也可以产生相反的效果，增加信任和利他主义。通过在所有三个项目中证明公民对政治腐败的反应从根本上是灵活的，我们建议这个项目提供了一个基本的见解，可以帮助公民对政治腐败作出反应，以捍卫民主的战斗口号，参与政治活动，并支持挑战者，同时保持与他们的公民的团结。