The Logic of the Novelist: The Causal Mechanism Approach in Public Opinion Research

SSRN Electronic Journal, April 2009

32 Pages Posted: 4 Mar 2015 Last revised: 7 Jun 2016

See all articles by Rodolfo Sarsfield

Rodolfo Sarsfield

Fundación Carolina; Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro (UAQ)

Fabian Echegaray

Market Analysis Brazil

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: March 3, 2015

Abstract

This paper aims to assess the value of the causal mechanism approach (Hedström and Swedberg, 1998; Elster, 1998; Gambetta, 1998) in public opinion research. With this idea in mind, our work explores the types of rationality that underlie choice for political regime, understanding those as causal mechanisms that intervene in the process of preference formation. In doing so, we seek to “clarify, what it might mean in practical terms – i.e., for practicing social scientists – to assume a mechanismic view of causation” (Gerring, 2007:165). The strategy is to test two types of rationality as process derived from supporting democracy at individual level. The analysis focuses on Brazil, a society that recently completed a successful process of transition towards democracy. Our interest is to focus on the balance between the impact of survey respondents‟ evaluations of different dimensions of democratic performance (that we label here as “utilitarian causal mechanism”), and the effects of citizens‟ normative preferences (that we label here as, “normative causal mechanism”), as well as their joint impact on molding individual preferences for a particular type of government in Brazil. The results endorse the hypothesis that utilitarian rationality prevails along some important signs of normative rationality. Finally, we suggest that if public opinion research only considers the utilitarian causal mechanism in preference formation, we would be considering only a portion of the entire portrait. Therefore, an argument in favor of the causal mechanism approach is recommended.

Suggested Citation

Sarsfield, Rodolfo and Echegaray, Fabian, The Logic of the Novelist: The Causal Mechanism Approach in Public Opinion Research (March 3, 2015). SSRN Electronic Journal, April 2009, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2573013 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2573013

Rodolfo Sarsfield (Contact Author)

Fundación Carolina ( email )

Madrid
Spain

Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro (UAQ) ( email )

Cerro de las Campanas S/N, Las Campanas
Queretaro, 76010
Mexico

Fabian Echegaray

Market Analysis Brazil ( email )

Rua Félix Kleis 23
Santa Mônica
Florianópolis, Santa Catarina 88035-330
Brazil

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