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System Change, Learning and Public Opinion about the Economy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2000

CHRISTOPHER J. ANDERSON  and
KATHLEEN M. O'CONNER
CHRISTOPHER J. ANDERSON
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science Binghampton University (State University of New York).
KATHLEEN M. O'CONNER
Affiliation:
S.C. Johnson Graduate School of Management Cornell University.
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Abstract

This study examines attitudes about the economy under conditions of system change. We argue that citizens in new market economics are relative novices with regard to understanding the new economic environment at the beginning of the transition phase, but that they accumulate experience as time passes. We develop and test two hypotheses: (1) we expect that, over time, economic perceptions more closely track objective economic performance; (2) as a corollary, we hypothesize that, over time, economic policy priorities of citizens in a new market economy more closely track objective economic performance. Time-series data of objective economic indicators and public opinion collected in East Germany between 1991 and 1995 are analysed using regression analyses and tests of structural change in parameters. We find that East Germans' economic perceptions correspond to actual economic trends as they develop experience with the political-economic system. The implications of our findings for research on the relationship between the economy and political support in societies in transition are discussed.

Type
Research Article
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , January 2000 , pp. 147 - 172
Copyright
© 2000 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

Earlier drafts of this article were presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago, 1995, and the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago, 1997. We thank the Forschungsgruppe Wahlen for providing the public opinion data used in this article. Many thanks to Larry Grossback, Simon Jackman, Helmut Norpoth, Peter Schrott, Dan Ward and the anonymous reviewers of this Journal for helpful comments on earlier drafts and ideas.