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from the and-a-polite-discussion-ensued... dept.
Recently published in Journal of Social and Political Psychology by Thomas F. Pettigrew seeks to understand the psychological profile of Trump supporters:
The Trump movement is not singular within the United States (the Know Nothing movement in the 1850s, the Wallace movement in the 1960s, and the more recent Tea Party Movement). Moreover, other democracies have seen similar movements (e.g., Austria's Freedom Party, Belgium's Vlaams Blok, France's National Front, Germany's Alternative for Germany Party (AfD), and Britain's U.K. Independence Party (UKIP).
In virtually all these cases, the tinder especially involved male nativists and populists who were less educated than the general population. But this core was joined by other types of voters as well. Five highly interrelated characteristics stand out that are central to a social psychological analysis – authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, outgroup prejudice, the absence of intergroup contact and relative deprivation.No one factor describes Trump's supporters. But an array of factors – many of them reflecting five major social psychological phenomena can help to account for this extraordinary political event: authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, prejudice, relative deprivation, and intergroup contact.
(Score: 3, Informative) by rigrig on Thursday December 07 2017, @09:31AM
The problem is the first-past-the-post system.
Just imagine Alice being the preferred choice of 40% of voters, and Bob the preferred candidate of 60%.
They are completely opposite: Alice voters hate almost all Bob policies and vise-versa.
In comes Carol, whose policies are exactly the same as Bob, except for some minor issue which splits the Bob/Carol voters evenly.
So now Alice wins with 40% votes over 30% for Bob and 30% for Carol, even though 60% would much rather see either Bob or Carol in charge.
And even if somehow Bob or Carol wins, that means you end up with a country where 40% of the voters ends up with a president whose policies they hate.
No one remembers the singer.