No CrossRef data available.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 November 2008
This article uses survey data from Tunisia to examine some of the ways that individual attitudes change in a developing society. At the same time, it is addressed to some inadequacies of modernisation theory, attempting both to understand better the impact of social change on attitudes, and to delineate the nature and consequences of different kinds of modernisation experiences. Modernisation studies usually treat lifestyle variations produced by social change as uni-dimensional so far as their effect on attitudes is concerned. The present study argues that lifestyles do not always change in an integrated fashion, and in particular that acculturation and socio-economic status, two basic dimensions of individual life circumstances in developing societies, often and increasingly vary independently of one another. It then demonstrates with data from Tunisia that measures of acculturation and socio-economic status bear independent and dissimilar relationships to many attitudes known to be associated with social change, and thereafter discusses the implications of these relationships for modernisation and political development. The focus of the analysis is on general theoretical issues.
page 474 note 1 See Lerner, Daniel, The Passing of Traditional Society (New York, 1958),Google Scholar and Karl, Deutsch, ‘Social Mobilization and Political Development’, in The American Political Science Review (Menasha), 55, 1961, pp. 493–514.Google Scholar
page 474 note 2 See Inkeles, Alex, ‘Making Men Modern: on the causes and consequences of individual change in six developing countries’, in The American Journal of Sociology (Chicago), LXXV, 09 1969, pp. 208–25,Google Scholar and ‘Participant Citizenship in Six Developing Countries’, in The American Political Science Review, LXIII, December 1969, pp. 1, 129–41; Kahl, Joseph, The Measurement of Modernism (Austin, 1968);Google ScholarLeVine, Robert, Klien, Nancy, and Owen, Constance, ‘Father-Child Relationships and Changing Life-Styles in Ibadan, Nigeria’, in Minar, Horace (ed.), The City in Modern Africa (New York, 1967), pp. 215–56;Google ScholarRogers, Everett, Modernization Among Peasants (New York, 1969);Google Scholar and Portes, Alejandro, ‘The Factor Structure of Modernity: empirical replications and a critique’, in The American Journal of Sociology, LXXIX, 07 1973, pp. 15–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
page 474 note 3 See Pye, Lucian, Politics, Personality and Nation-Building (New Haven, 1962);Google ScholarBanfield, Edward, The Moral Basis of a Backward Society (Glencoe, 1958);Google ScholarHagen, Everett, On the Theory of Social Change (Homewood, 1962);Google Scholar and McClelland, David, The Achieving Society (Princeton, 1961).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
page 474 note 4 See Almond, Gabriel and Powell, G. Bingham, Comparative Politics: a developmental approach (Boston, 1966);Google ScholarEisenstadt, S. N., Modernization: protest and change (Englewood Cliffs, 1966);Google ScholarBlack, C. E., The Dynamics of Modernization (New York, 1966);Google ScholarApter, David, The Politics of Modernization (Chicago, 1965);Google Scholar and Huntington, Samuel P., Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven, 1968).Google Scholar
page 474 note 5 See Whitaker, C. S., ‘A Dysrhythmic Process of Political Change’, in World Politics (Princeton), XIX, 01 1967, pp. 190–217.Google Scholar
page 474 note 6 Migdal, Joel, Peasants, Politics and Revolution (Princeton, 1974), p. 12.Google Scholar
page 475 note 1 Ibid. p. 20.
page 475 note 2 Tessler, Mark A., ‘Tunisian Attitudes Toward Women and Childrearing’, in Allman, J. (ed.), Women's Status and Fertility in the Muslim World (New York, 1978);Google Scholar and Tessler and Patricia Freeman, ‘Regime Orientation and Participant Citizenship in Developing Countries: hypotheses and a test with longitudinal data from Tunisia’, forthcoming.
page 475 note 3 LeVine, Robert, ‘Political Socialization and Culture Change’, in Geertz, Clifford (ed.), Old Societies and New States (New York, 1963), pp. 280–303.Google Scholar
page 475 note 4 Bill, James and Hardgrave, Robert, Comparative Politics: the quest for theory (Columbus, 1973), pp. 115 ff.Google Scholar
page 475 note 5 See Frank, André Gunder, Capitalism and Underdevelopment in Latin America (New York, 1969);Google ScholarLeys, Colin, Underdevelopment in Kenya: the political economy of neo-colonialism, 1964–1971 (Berkeley, 1974);Google Scholar and Wallerstein, Immanuel, The Modern World System (New York, 1974).Google Scholar
page 477 note 1 Deutsch, loc. cit.
page 477 note 2 LeVine et al. loc. cit. p. 224.
page 477 note 3 See Rogers, op. cit. p. 160.
page 477 note 4 Doob, Leonard, Becoming More Civilized (New Haven, 1960), pp. 49 ff.Google Scholar
page 477 note 5 Lerner, op. cit. pp. 43 ff.
page 477 note 6 Inkeles, ‘Making Men Modern’.
page 477 note 7 Kahl, op. cit. p. 71.
page 478 note 1 The works of Portes, loc. cit., Rogers, op. cit., and Kahl, op. cit. are noteworthy in this regard.
page 478 note 2 These studies include works by Migdal, op. cit.; Bendix, Reinhard, ‘Tradition and Modernity Reconsidered’, in Comparative Studies in Society and History (Cambridge), IX, 04 1967, pp. 292–346;Google ScholarEisenstadt, S. N., Post-Traditional Society (New York, 1972);Google ScholarGusfield, Joseph, ‘Tradition and Modernity: misplaced polarities in the study of social change’, in The American Journal of Sociology, LXXII, 01 1966, pp. 351–62;Google ScholarLloyd, and Rudolph, Suzanne, The Modernity of Tradition (Chicago, 1967);Google Scholar and Tessler, Mark A., ‘Development, Oil and Cultural Change in the Maghreb’, in Sherbiny, Naiem A. and Tessler, Mark A. (eds.), Arab Oil: impact on the Arab countries and global implications (New York, 1976), pp. 130–60.Google Scholar
page 478 note 3 Huntington, Samuel P., ‘The Change to Change’, in Macridis, Roy C. and Brown, Bernard E. (eds.), Comparative Politics: notes and readings (Homewood, 1972), pp. 405–25.Google Scholar
page 481 note 1 Micaud, Charles, Tunisia: the politics of modernization (New York, 1964), pp. 131ff.Google Scholar, and ‘ Leadership and Development: the case of Tunisia’, in Comparative Politics (New York), 11 07 1969, pp. 468–84;Google Scholar see also Tessler, Mark A., O'Barr, William, and Spain, David, ‘Tradition and Identity in Changing Africa (New York, 1973),Google Scholar and Tessler, , ‘Political Generations’, in Stone, R. and Simmons, J. (eds.), Change in Tunisia (Albany, 1976), pp. 73–106.Google Scholar
page 482 note 1 A high ‘loading’ being defined rather stringently as one that exceeds 0·350; see Portes, loc. cit. p. 21.
page 484 note 1 See, for example, Apter, op. cit. p. 10; Almond, Gabriel and Verba, Sidney, The Civic Culture (Boston, 1965), pp. 136 ff. and 208 ff.;Google ScholarArmer, Michael and Youtz, Robert, ‘Formal Education and Individual Modernity in an African Society’, in The American Journal of Sociology, LXXVI, 01 1975, pp. 604–26;Google ScholarSuzman, Richard, ‘Psychological Modernity’, in International Journal of Comparative Sociology (Leiden), XIV, 1974, pp. 273–87;Google ScholarInkeles, Alex, ‘The Modernization of Man’, in Weiner, Myron (ed.), Modernization (New York, 1966), pp. 146ff.;Google ScholarPye, , Politics, Personality and Nation-Building, pp. 52 ff.Google Scholar; Doob, op. cit.; and Lerner, op. cit. pp. 47 ff.
page 484 note 2 See, for example, Portes, loc. cit.; LeVine, Klien, and Owen, loc. cit.; and Kahl, op. cit.
page 484 note 3 See Inkeles, ‘Participant Citizenship in Six Developing Countries’; Hayward, Fred, ‘Correlates of National Political Integration: the case of Ghana’, in Comparative Political Studies (Beverly Hills), VII, 1974, pp. 165–92;Google ScholarHolm, John, Dimensions of Mass Involvement in Botswana Politics: a test of alternative theories (Beverly Hills, 1974);Google ScholarHuntington, , ‘The Change to Change’, p. 411;Google ScholarSherrill, Kenneth, ‘The Attitudes of Modernity’, in Comparative Politics, 11, 01 1968, pp. 184–210;Google Scholar and Rustow, Darkwart and Ward, Robert, ‘Introduction’, in Ward, and Rustow, (eds.), Political Modernization in Japan and Turkey (Princeton, 1964), pp. 3–13.Google Scholar
page 484 note 4 Tessler, Mark A., ‘Cultural Modernity: evidence from Tunisia’, in Social Science Quarterly (Austin), LII, 09 1971, pp. 290–308;Google Scholar ‘The Application of Western Theories and Measures of Political Participation to a Single-Party North African State’, in Comparative Political Studies, v, July 1972, pp. 174–91; and ‘Political Generations’.
page 485 note 1 See Tessler, Mark A., ‘Problems of Measurement in Comparative Research: perspectives from an African survey’, in Social Science Information (The Hague), XII, 08 1973, pp. 29–43;Google Scholar and ‘Response Set and Interview Bias’, in William O'Barr, David Spain, and Mark A. Tessler (eds.), Survey Research in Africa: its applications and limits (Evanston, 1973).Google Scholar
page 485 note 2 Interval data and regression are used here in the interest of parsimony and rigour, but it should be noted that contingency table analysis produced the same findings as those reported in this article in all major respects.
page 486 note 1 In view of the widespread interest in education, a separate partial was computed between years of schooling and each scale with socio-economic status held constant. The findings were identical to those based on the general measure of acculturation. Education is independently associated to a strong and statistically significant degree with only the four cultural orientation scales.
page 488 note 1 Lerner, op. cit. p. 439.
page 488 note 2 See Armer, Michael and Schnaiberg, Allan, ‘Measuring Individual Modernity: a near myth’, Conference on Methodological Problems in Comparative Sociological Research, Bloomington, 1971;Google Scholar and Migdal, op. cit.
page 488 note 3 For example, Portes, loc. cit. pp. 22–3, and Suzman, loc. cit.
page 490 note 1 These suggestions are consistent with the social science literature on political instability – for example, Davies, James, ‘Toward a Theory of Revolution’, in American Sociological Review (Washington), XXVII, 02 1962, pp. 5–19;Google ScholarGurr, Ted, Why Men Rebel (Princeton, 1971,);Google Scholar and Huntington, op. cit. pp. 55 ff. – and on membership in revolutionary movements, e.g. Hoffer, Eric, ‘The True Believer’, in Welch, Claude and Taintor, Mavis (eds.), Revolution and Political Change (North Scituate, 1972), pp. 202–7,;Google Scholar Lucian Pye, ‘Personality and Communism in Malaya’, in ibid. pp. 220–7; Toch, Hans, The Social Psychology of Social Movements (Indianapolis, 1965), pp. 185 ff.;Google Scholar and Greene, Thomas, Comparative Revolutionary Movements (New York, 1974), pp. 146 ff.Google Scholar Thus, on the one hand, our findings give additional empirical support to existing theoretical formulations, and they highlight some of the linkages in propositions that relate national development experiences to political outcomes at the societal level. On the other hand, this literature increases confidence in our own assessment of the political consequences of acculturation unaccompanied by increased socio-economic status.
page 492 note 1 For additional discussion, see Tessler, ‘Development, Oil and Cultural Change in the Maghreb’.