▪ Abstract The field of political socialization is often stereotyped in terms of some of the earliest work in the field and is neglected outside certain areas of American political behavior. However, the continuing and vibrant stream of work in political socialization holds potential for addressing many critical issues across American, comparative, and international politics. This article discusses three themes: the construction of a more genuinely comparative field of political socialization, a reconsideration of the relevance of childhood to politics following its virtual abandonment by the field for many years, and the importance of understanding the origins of preferences. Cidadania nao tem tamanho/Tamanho nao e documento. You don't have to be big to be a citizen/Size is not important.           Augusto Sergio Suares Dutra, a 10-year-old Brazilian,                quoted in Guerra 2002, p. 77

NOT YOUR PARENTS' POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION: Introduction for a New Generation

Political socialization research holds the distinction of benefiting, possibly more fully than other subfields of study, from conceptual and empirical contributions from many academic disciplines. While the main emphases of scholars from different fields may reflect certain intradisciplinary perspectives, the cumulative product is distinctly interdisciplinary, as seen in the widescope of contemporary research findings. Educators have been concerned with the role of the schools in the political socialization process, while sociologists have directed attention more broadly toward the roles of many potential agencies of political socialization. Psychologists, focusing upon political socialization as a learning process, have directed attention to learning and developmental theories. Political scientists have examined both the antecedents and consequences of the socialization process.

Political Socialization: A Topical Bibliography.

This study examines the impact of experience with the criminal justice system on defendant attitudes toward legal authorities, law, and government. Our focus is on the extent to which particular experiences affect more general attitudes toward the political system in which courts are embedded. We are particularly concerned with assessing the relative impact of prior attitudes and particular features of current experience (e.g., outcome favorability, distributive justice, and procedural justice) on this generalization process. The data come from a panel study of felony defendants in three cities. Our results suggest two major conclusions. First, personal experiences with government agencies have an impact on broader attitudes toward government. Second, this generalization process is not dominated by the favorability of the outcome for the citizen, even in situations in which the stakes are especially high. The fairness of the experience has a substantial influence on the lessons about the nature of law and government that citizens learn from their encounters with government institutions.

Maintaining Allegiance toward Political Authorities: The Role of Prior Attitudes and the Use of Fair Procedures

In this brief historical overview of the study of the political socialization process and the acquisition of political knowledge, the authors maintain that the study of youth, political literacy, and civic activism is both a complex undertaking and normatively loaded. The research demands not only rigor in design but the exploration of new venues for a better understanding of those agents, activities, and interactions that shape young people's visions of the political world and their choice to participate or not participate in it. There is a need for a clearer understanding of what we know about politics and how we can link that knowledge to civic engagement. An important key to this understanding is greater awareness of and attention paid by political scientists to developmental psychology and theories of the learning processes. Only then can we make informed decisions about appropriate standards of civic education and civic engagement for our youth and throughout the life cycle.

Political Literacy, Civic Education, and Civic Engagement: A Return to Political Socialization?

This article identifies four fundamental modes of thought employed in the cognition of policy problems. These modes of thought are moral, cause-effect, sociocentric, and imaginative. Nine variants of these four forms are described and investigated among a small sample of adolescents. The maturation of these forms of thought appears limited during adolescence, and change is not well predicted by the respondent's level of politicization. The article concludes with some speculations about the structure of socialization theory as it relates to the development of fundamental forms of political thinking.

The Development of Policy Thinking in Adolescence

Perhaps the most dramatic finding of recent research on the political socialization of children is that youngsters appear to be overwhelmingly favorably disposed toward political objects which cross their vision Officers and institutions of government are regarded as benevolent, worthy, competent, serving and powerful The implications of such findings are striking indeed Childhood political dispositions may represent the roots of later patriotism; we may be observing the building of basic regime-level supportive values at a very young age These findings are by no means new; in fact, they might be classified as part of the conventional wisdom of the discipline Moreover, they are extremely well documented, and the study of childhood political socialization has advanced to consider far more than basic regime-level norms Despite all this, however, there are still many empirical questions to be asked about such norms Perhaps the recent assertion that the political scientist's model of socialization is “static and homogeneous” is particularly apropos here Consider two closely related characteristics of the appropriate literature: 1) the “positive image” which children have about politics and political figures has been synthesized from data gathered largely in the United States and to some extent in urban, industrialized communities within the United States; and 2) empirical explanation of the favorable disposition which children manifest has not progressed very far Though there may be hypotheses about how children get this way, there has been little systematic testing of the relationships between variables

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/1952950.pdf

Herbert Hirsch

Papers

The Malevolent Leader: Political Socialization in an American Sub-Culture