Research shows that conservative white males are more likely to espouse climate change denial than other groups for two reasons. They tend to filter out any information that is different from their already-held worldview because it threatens the identity, status and esteem they receive by being part of their group, he said. Sociologists call this ‘Identity Protective Cognition.’
Secondly, conservative white males have a stronger need to justify the status quo and resist attempts to change it. Sociologists call this ‘System Justification.’
It’s not uncommon for those of us on the Left to wonder why citizens who are so directly and adversely affected by policies promoted by the Republican Party nonetheless continue to voice their support for that very same party. It often seems so utterly illogical as to border on the insane.
Here’s one explanation, linked to the observations noted in the quote above:
The strongest form of the system justification hypothesis, which draws also on the logic of cognitive dissonance theory, is that under certain circumstances members of disadvantaged groups would be even more likely than members of advantaged groups to support the status quo. If there is indeed a motivation to justify the system to reduce ideological dissonance and defend against threats to the system’s legitimacy, then it may be that those who suffer the most because of the system are also those who would have the most to explain, justify, and rationalize. One way to minimize dissonance would be to redouble one’s commitment and support for the system, much as hazed initiates pledge increased loyalty to the fraternity that hazes them….
An additional hypothesis that may be derived from system justification theory is that people should be motivated to defend the existing social system against threats to the stability or legitimacy of the system. If there is a defensive motivation associated with system justification, then it should be more pronounced under circumstances that threaten the status quo. *
There’s a certain logic to all of this, if we understand that fear of change is one of the core foundations of conservatism. Regardless of the changes being proposed or imposed, the comfort of the familiar resonates more deeply with those inclined to conservative thought and principles.
But if those principles are likewise causing harm, the question which those of us on the Left want to desperately to ask is: Are you not paying attention?
How does the fear of change, and the corresponding unwillingness to consider new information or perspectives, merit greater loyalty than one’s own well-being—now and in the future? We’re presumably dealing with a lot of rational and intelligent adults, so how do those more basic fears outweigh the risks entailed in choosing to stand where they are in the face of so much evidence suggesting greater harm?
It’s certainly logical and appealing to desire the approval and benefits of identity, status, and esteem from belonging to a community of like-minded others. Liberals/progressives are no different in that regard. But how do we persuade those whose insistence on adhering to conservative ideology that there are also serious costs associated with blind devotion to the principles when their application risks so much harm and for so much longer than the “benefits” of preserving the status quo?
Perhaps we might feel less of an urgency if we could be certain that the risks and consequences might remain safely within the confines of that ideological bubble, but it doesn’t work that way in real life. Denying the clear evidence of climate change is not just an ideological exercise in group-think and partisan loyalty.
We will all suffer as that problem unfolds, and it will be at best maddening that more was not done because too many held fast to psychological and emotional gratifications which will have proven themselves to be extremely shortsighted and of only the shortest of short-term benefits. This is getting serious.
* SOURCE: Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition by John T. Jost Stanford University; Arie W. Kruglanski University of Maryland at College Park; Jack Glaser University of California, Berkeley; Frank J. Sulloway University of California, Berkeley.
Psychological Bulletin Copyright 2003 by the American Psychological Association, Inc. 2003, Vol. 129, No. 3, 339–375
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