@spswspsw.york are cultural differences between nations a barrier to cross-national policy learning?...
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@spswspsw.york
Are Cultural Differences Between Nations a Barrier to Cross-National Policy Learning?
Award ES/J00460X/1
John Hudson University of York, UKNam K. Jo SungKongHoe University, South KoreaAntonia Keung University of York, UK
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Overview
• Draw together two strands of research
• Policy transfer/policy learning processes
• Impact of culture on politics of welfare policy
• Some initial reflections
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Policy Transfer & Culture
• Often shapes search for lessons
• Key to understanding national differences
• Said to influence policy success in host country…
• …and so of transfer to recipient country
• A commonly cited barrier to policy transfer
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Welfare States & Culture
• ‘Culture matters’ thesis
• ‘Macro’ perspective– Broad conception, stable dominant beliefs
– often post hoc explanations
• ‘Micro’ perspective– Public opinion,
– specific issues, unstable attitudes
• Culture is a nebulous concept
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‘Theories of political culture emphasize the distinctiveness of national political values, and imply that trying to draw lessons across national boundaries will fail. The success of a programme in a given country is ascribed to its distinctive values and beliefs or style of policy, implying that any attempt to export it elsewhere would be doomed to failure because each national culture is deemed unique. A programme that would be acceptable in Swedish political culture may not be acceptable in the United States, and vice versa. However, such general statements do not identify the specific features of a culture that are obstacles to lesson-drawing.’
(Rose, 2004: 93)
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Can We Measure Culture?
• Jo (2011) culture as stable societal values– More concrete than macro
– More enduring than micro
– Proxy for national culture
• Cultural context of social policy making– Interacts with politics, economics, institutions
– culture as meso-level influence
• Not a decisive influence, but a significant one
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Extracting Societal Values• Identify stable, distinct examples of societal values
• Data from successive waves EVS/WVS data 1981-2009
– 173 societal cases; 243,975 responses
– 59 countries x max 4 time points
– Factor analysis of pooled data
– Manual inspection and reanalysis
• Built on Hofstede, Jo, Schwartz, van de Vijver et al
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Extracting Societal ValuesSocietal Value Example Survey Item
Relgiosity God is important in my life
Conservative Social Norms Is divorce permissible?
Permissive Values on Adherence to Laws
Justifiable to cheat on taxes?
Optimistic Values Satisfied with your life?
Traditional Family Values Is marriage an out-dated institution?
Interpersonal tolerance Would you not like heavy drinkers as your neigbours?
Political Activeness Do you participate in lawful demonstrations?
Political Orientedness Do you regularly discuss politics with friends?
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Policy Impact
• Regression analysis, medium term picture• Independent variables– Societal values – Economic context (GDP per capita, growth, unemployment)– Political context (cabinet composition)– Historical Institutional context (welfare regime)
• Dependent Variables:– unemployment spending– family policy spending– maternity leave policy structures
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Policy Impact
Unemp Exp (% PE)
Unemp Exp (% GDP)
Fam Pol Exp (% PE)
Fam Pol Exp (% GDP)
Maternity Leave (FTE)
Culture Matters?
✔✔ ✔✔
Any Key Values?
- Perm Laws+ Toler
- Perm Laws+ Toler
- Religiosity+ Con Norms
+ Toler+ Perm Laws+ Opt Val
Other Factors?
Regime (SE)Economy
Regime (SE)Economy
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Policy Impact
Unemp Exp (% PE)
Unemp Exp (% GDP)
Fam Pol Exp (% PE)
Fam Pol Exp (% GDP)
Maternity Leave (FTE)
Culture Matters?
✔✔ ✔✔ ✔ ✔ ✔✔
Any Key Values?
- Perm Laws+ Toler
- Perm Laws+ Toler
- Religiosity+ Con Norms
- Religiosity - Religiosity+ Con Norms
+ Toler+ Perm Laws+ Opt Val
Other Factors?
Regime (SE)Economy
Regime (SE)Economy
Regime Regime (SD)
RegimeLeft Cabinet
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Policy Impact
• Good degree of support for culture matters thesis
• Some interesting findings– Interpersonal tolerance, religiosity
• Some important limits– Data driven, intepretation, gaps in data
• NB: only examples of societal values
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Policy Impact
• Ex ante… similar for ex post• Both matter for Policy Transfer
• Can examination of culture help with identifying candidates for policy transfer?
• QCA methods may help trace processes?
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Policy Impact: Family Policy
Proximate Factors
Remote Factors
Two routes with combined coverage of 0.773 and consistency with LOW SPENDING of 0.901
growth
Consistency with LOW SPENDING of 0.946 and raw coverage of 0.328
left government AND growth
Consistency with LOW SPENDING of 0.957 and raw coverage of 0.670
LEFT GOVERNMENT
Consistency with HIGH SPENDING of 0.813 and raw coverage of 0.265
EXIT ROUTE
Intermediate Factors
LIBERAL
Consistency with LOW SPENDING of 0.753
Consistency with LOW SPENDING of 0.942 and raw
coverage of 0.613
TRADITIONAL FAMILY VALUES AND RELIGIOSITY
LEFT GOVERNMENT
Consistency with HIGH SPENDING of 0.901 and raw coverage of 0.315
EXIT ROUTE
TRADITIONAL FAMILY VALUES AND conservative social norms
Consistency with LOW SPENDING of 0.913 and raw
coverage of 0.503