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Tlli~ is a paper about the way the Romanian public opinio,n i~ ordered
by topics and factors. The approach i;; of an exploratory nature.
The structtu·al approach to the public opinion aims at locating diffe-
rent types of opinions in the wcial and cultural ~pace. Individual and fa-
mily status variables are t.he basie stuff of the social space. The norms,
values and pattenlR are the stuff for the cultural space. That cultural
dimension of the opace is much more difficult to be captured. In order to
do it for the purposes of that paper I will use ecological yariables of aggre-
gated and non-aggregated type.
From the methodological point of view I try to demonstrate the
usefulness of enlarging the types of variables that could help the under-
standing of opinion phenomena. Aggregate demographic items as total
fertility rate, infant mortality and urbanization degree proved to be very
helpful in specifiying the social context of the opinions. Voting behavior is
easier to be understood if having a unitary file not only with opinion items
but also with items referring to the way the population from the intervi-
ewee's community behaved during the last elections. There are still a lot
of problems to be solved in this type of multilevel approach. Here I try
to put the problems and to delineate the solution for some of them.
The main component of the let•el approach in public opinion is of
the type 'to what degree ... ', 'how much' ... That is dominant not only
in data collection but also in data proceBsing and publication. The struc-
tural approach centered around the concept of relation is especially a data
analysis approach. Causal relations measured by techniques of the regres-
sion and factor analysis family are the most frequent ones in opinion data
analysis. Due to the exploratory nature of this study I will rely, also, on
less powerful techniques that have the advantage of being in accordance
with the nature of the data and the low level of theoretical elaboration in
the structural approach to the public opinion in Eastern wcieties. Such
techniques are centered around the concept of cluster analysis.
For the greatest part of the paper, the data are fi"Om the project
The Social Atlas of Romania, that I directed at the Center fo1· Urban ~tnd
Regional Sociology in Bucharest, in the period 1991-1992 1• The sm-yey
I am referring to was carried out in September 1991 on a national repre-
sentative sample of 1469 persons. A three-stage random sample with stra-
tification in the first two stages was used.
1 Humitru Snndu, Til(; Saci.ut AU a~ of RnJT!unio: 1991-1992. (in '1 crnantln)~ Center
for Crban und Regimml ~ociology, BuC'han'~l, 1H92.
.·.
Flo· 1. -
..I ypcs and examples of top1cs structurmg the Romaman public opmton m 1991-1992 .
3 The slruclun· of the Homanian public opinhlll 145
l.OTil\'(i OPTIOXS
Septemher 1991 when the fieldwmk was made was situated more
than one year from the general elections of J\-Iay 1990 and before the local
elections of ~March 199 2. The Social Atlas questionnaire that was used for
the sm"Yey included one question about the Yoting intentions for gcneml
elections and one question about the Yoting intentions for local elections.
'l'he distribution of answers for the two types of elections is presen-
ted in table 1 :
T(/ble I
general
local elections
elections
The break was clear. In J\'lay 1!l!JO XSF got 66% out of th(l total
Yotes. The local elections from Jlfarch 1992 hrought to the NSF about one
third of yotes, as expected.
At the mid 1992 the dist,rihution of the voting intentions for the
general elections is dose enough. The Fwnt,has a similar position. In the
opposition field emerged a significant actor - the Democratic Convention.
But the predictions for the genmal elections in September 1992 arc hard
to be formulated: the Demouatic Con1'ention was left by the National
Liberal Pa1 ty and NSF didflefl also into two parties.
In order to loeatc the opinions about voting for t,he NS~F in the soci<>-
cultural space one could follow the route of integrating them into the
'sub-spaces', mentioned in fig. 2. 'l'aken as a kind of key points in the pro-
uess of getting an integrated image about the reference item(s), these &nb-
spaces could by considered as a paradigm to be used in public opinion te-
seareh. ''! .
Needless to insist that, as any model, that is a design to be adapt~d
depending on specific interests and constraints.
r 146
(SOCIOCULTCRAL PARADIGM)
Dumitru Sandu 4
Fig. 2.- The main categories of integrating an opinion view into its own sociocultural space.
An operational view for the first two sequences of the paradigm is pre-
sented below using correlation coefficients between the items of voting
for NSF one t.he one hand and, in the other hand, other polit.ical items or
local culture one.
NSF90 i• an ecological item built by comidering the percentage of
voters for ~SF in the gen<>ral elections from 1990 in the departament
where was located the interviewee of our questionnaire from 1991.
The implied hypotheses is that we expect to have more options for
this party in 1991 in the areas whe1·e there have effecth·ely being more
votes for NSF in 1990.
Or, more I(Pnera.lly, one could expect to )Jan• a structural fit between
the political map of the t•ountry in two different years.
No matter bow serious was the change in the percentages of voters
for different parties, their comlitional distributions function of territories
could be consistent.
Technically, the NSl!'90 was built by assigning to the interviewees
from the same department a value identical with the percentage of voters
for that party in 1990. In a similar manner were constructed two other
· items - NLP90 - percentage of voters for National Liberal Party in
1990 and HUNGP90- percentage of voters for the Democra.tic Union
of Hungarians from Romania.
The hypothesses impied by this type of technical option was not
falsfied by the empirical data : NSF and NSF90, for example, are corre-
lated at the Jevelr = 0. 1384. Such a value is different from zero at a sig-
nificant level pf p = 0.0001. (For the whole paper we used two tailed
tests for the correlation coefficients and marked p = 0,001 with ** and
p = 0.01 with *)
5 The stt·udure of the Hom!mian public opinion 147
:NSF - J,OC i~ the item for the persons choosing that party for the
local elections. Both opinion items NSF and NSF - LOC areconsistent
with the ecological variable NSF90.
Table 2 presents the main empirical correlates of NSF voting yaria-
bles with other political variables and ecological ones.
The correlation matrix clearly supports the idea that in Romania
different local political cultures started to be crystallized. And the subjects
are answering the voting questions not only depending on their status or
their personal opinions but also depending on the local dominant pattern.
NSF 1111rlisans arP non-multiparty-oriented and are supporters of
ha,·ing the sante nu.tyors-a clear conservath·e attitude.
WlJat about the regional differentiat.ion of the voting behavior~
With the occasion of the 1990 general elections snell a differentiation was
clear : ::\Ioldm·a and the Soutlwrn part of the country voted massively for
the }'rout. The opposition got roots especially in Transilvania, Banat,
Cri~ana-Maramure~, and Bucharest.
For 1991, the regional I'Oots of the voting behavior seem to be wea-
ker than one year before. Is that an effect of a measurement error (grea-
ter in 1991 than in 1990) or is it really a tendency of the political life to
become more independent in relation with the tenitory. ·Even if both of
the factors are acting, I support especially the second hypotheses : the
ecological variables are going to loose their initial importance. Comparing
different surveys in different years will help to prove it.Similarly, compa-
ring the results of different elections will be wry helpful for testing the
above-mentioned hypotheses.
Table 2
Symbol of
:\[caning of the ~ymbol i'\SF SlO ;-(SF NSF·LOC
lite ilem
(table 2, continued)
Symbol of
the item
:\feaning of the symbol I l\SF 90 KSF NSF-LOC
I
TRANSlLV - 6262 .. - 1699** - 0118
DOBROGEA 1508*"' 1039** 0016
Cultural areas *
SOUTHE-E South East area 2609** 1186** 0025
CENT-SCD Central South area 264:~*"" 0868** 0333
CVHGMSS.J Covasna, Harghita - 6G02** - 1556** - 0444
Mure~, S:'ilaj area
l\lacro·arl'as
STATllS Sl)AU·:
From table 2 it results that both NSF voters and undecided are sig-
nificantly present in areas where there were many voters for the Front
in 1990. The relation of NSF90 is higher with NSF than with undecided.
7
:__ _ _ _ _ _ _ 'rht' <;lruclurc of lhc Homaniim public opinion 14!!
If considering only the subjective status of the voters (or the sellf-
defined status) the situation is different. The subjective status profile
of the UNDECided is closer than that of NSF to the cultural pattern
of the areas with a high value of the variable XSF90 (see table 4).
The data from tables 2 and 4 suggest the hypotheses that the voters
for the Front in 1991 and the undecided have being effective voters of the
NSF in 1990.
Later on, starting with 1991, a split occurred in the mass of Front
voters and a significant part of them (about one half, considering the data
from tab!~ I) became undecided.
To the degree of a consistence betweer. objective status and the
subjective one, it is legitimate to formulate another hypothesis:
the NSJ,' voters have a hingher social status than the UNDECided.
In 1992 the Sational Salvation Front split into two parties -NSF
and the Democratic Front of the National Salvation. Petre Romn is
the leader of the first and Ion IlieMu is the symbol of the second. Could
We say, depending on the results of this analysis, that the political redefini-
tion of the NSF followed not only the interests of politicians but also a
social division line into the mass of former voters for NSF~ As a hypo-
thesis, I say yes.
Table 4
4 - !! 3775
130 Dumitru Sandu
Table 5
Parameters of the logistic regression model with NSF as dependent variable
Notr::
Chi-Square df Significance
Goodness of Fit 1457.234 1464 ·.144V
Pcrc~nt of correct predicted values with the model 68.55
OPI:\'ION SPACE
Table 6
Ul'IDECIDED
symbol meaning NSF90 !\SF
bow to vote
From the opinio:p. point of view, the typical NSF voter in 1991 was
characterized by high lew! for the items of satisfaction, status self-evalua-
tion institutional trust and optimism.
He considers also that the local community problems are not so
serious. All these demonstrate a low level of aspirations, entirely consistent
with the low level of education and cultural consumption.
The typical undecided is also a low cultural consumer. As we
know from table 4, he has a lower self-defined status than the NSF voter.
In spite of such a social status the undecided voter is highly dissatisfied
with his life and his home. He does not trmt the state institutions and
is very pessimistic.
So the politically undecided are a segment of population that is low
status and dissatisfied, in opposition with the NSI<' voters, that are higher
status and satisfied.
I l\-luntcniu
Ollenia
:3257**
- 2184
28411
1
1
1.0000
268:!
4549** - 0861
2683
1 .ooco
4549*"'
- 0861
1.0000
Dobrogea
Transi\Y - 4510** - 5722** :!073* - 3567*
Danat - 4588** - 3078* - 0946 - 1938
CriJ?--l\Ul - 4 739"* - 4504 ** 1159 - 5206**
Bucun·~ti - 3462* -
4197** - 4801 *"' - 1653
Crban - 0247 - 2494 - 71:l1 ** 0972
Table 7b
Similarity matrix between the cultural profiles of the historical regions
'
I
'l'ransilv
I
Banat
I
Cri~-1\IM
I
Ducurc-5ti
II Urban
In order to find the best predielon for the whole set of opm10ns
••peeified in the text of the paper a special form of fact.or analyoie was used:
1. in the first step I computed the correlation matrix between 13
status Yaiiables and 62 opinion items;
2. using the opinion itcrn ar; 'nnits' all(} ~->ta.t.u~ vatiahles as varia-
bles, a new correlation matlix was computed staiting from the results of
step 1;
3. a principal component method was used for the ext.raction of
the faetorR and a Yarimax method to rotate them. '!'he status variable
in the same factor is relevant for the same set of opinions.
Below are pn•sented the technical results of the principal compo-
nentR a,naly8i~:
HCK<iAHTAK 98219*
HOM ANTAl\ 96850*
EI>l.JCAT10I\" H6646*
CITY- 1.\IMIGI{AN'f ~1204 7*
AGE !10963*
CAR- 0\\"KEn 9072.7*
J~JH.'STHJAL-JOB 87586*
<:0:\IMCTEH 86020*
ESTDfATEJ>- INCOJ\IE H0796*
f!Ol"SWIFE 7HS51"'
llE~SIONER 781H.i3
AGRICl.:L 1THE- .JOB 7HOOt.i
~IAN H7176*
Eigenvalues
Factor
absolute YaluP percent Yahw cumulated
FACTOR 1 FACTOR 2
migration- FACTOR 3 FACTH 4
age-educa- ethnicity
experi('ncc
income
tion-job
AGE U0145
Il\DCSTRIAL JOD -88330
PENSIONEH 87067
EDCCATION -70042
AGHICL'LTIJRE JOB 67447
COM~ICTEH 90101
!MIGRANT -83782
CAR OWJSEH
HCl\GARIAN 97899
ROMANIA"' -95723
MAN 79932
t
I,