Ronald Inglehart
Ronald F. Inglehart ( born September 5, 1934 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States) is an American political scientist and since 1978 professor at the University of Michigan.
Academic CV
By 1956, Inglehart studied at Northwestern University, where he completed his studies with a Bachelor's degree. Then he studied until 1962 at the Master's degree program at the University of Chicago. In the years 1963/64, he finally completed a Fulbright Fellowship at the University of Leiden ( Netherlands). 1967 doctorate Inglehart at the University of Chicago. Since 1978 he is professor of political science at the University of Michigan. He is also program director since 1985 of the Center for Political Studies of the University of Michigan.
Furthermore Inglehart was a visiting professor at numerous universities: University of Mannheim; University of Kyoto (Japan ); Dōshisha University, Kyoto (Japan ); Free University of Berlin; University of Leiden (The Netherlands ); Academia Sinica, Taipei (Taiwan ); Berlin Science Center for Social Research; University of Rome (Italy). Since 2008, Inglehart is three months of the year " Wisdom professor " at the Jacobs University Bremen and member of the Bremen International Graduate School of Social Sciences ( BIGSSS ).
Other previous activities: participation in the Euro - barometer, the World Values Surveys, editorial work on several scientific journals, scientific advisory board of the Science Centre Berlin for Social Research, etc.
Inglehart 2011 got together with Pippa Norris the Skytteanska priset Uppsala University.
Change in values
Inglehart became famous in the 1970s for his theory of value change. The theory is based on the hierarchy of needs by Abraham Maslow. According to this model the human needs form the "steps" of a pyramid and build this one-dimensional theory under on each other. Man tries therefore to satisfy first the needs of low levels before the next stages become important. Who was frustrated, for example, in his need for self-preservation or security, will want to meet those needs first. Only then will he claimed "higher needs " strive such as social approval or self-realization. According to Inglehart people develop a materialist / post- materialist attitude during her youth. The greater the formative security ( ie, the greater the prosperity that a person experiences during her childhood ), it is more likely that this person developed a post- materialistic attitude. Experience a person other hand, poverty, it is more likely to develop a materialistic attitude.
His theory states that as the wealth of a society, the pursuit of materialistic values (eg tendency to safety and security of primary care ) decreases, while the desire increases after post-materialist values (eg tendency to political freedom, environmental protection). Inglehart believes that materialists lean towards more conservative values , post-materialists rather values of self-development. So are materialists, for example, homosexuality negative about and disapprove of abortions. They are patriotic and religious than post-materialists. This leads Inglehart back to being an individual who experienced little formative security, seeks support in religion. In contrast, post-materialists are in the so-called " new political movements," such as, heavily over-represented, for example, the peace movement or the environmental movement. You have a strong tendency parties of the "new politics ", such as the Greens to choose. In general, the emergence of the Greens is attributed to a large extent on the values change.
Empirical measurement
For statistical review of the theory was constructed by Inglehart called the Inglehart - or post-materialism index, the materialists differs on a ranking scale of post-materialists. The index is methodologically controversial among social scientists. In addition, empirical studies seem one-dimensional development, Inglehart predicted (eg Klein 1995) to refute in part.
Inglehart's three-stage theory
Recent considerations
In his more recent works, Inglehart has reinforced the role of religion and religious cultures for the development of democracy and politics. He sees a strong connection between processes of secularization and democratization, which are connected to each other through modernization. However, the different religious cultures lead to path dependencies of modernization.