well named
poorly undertitled
- Oct 2, 2018
- 432
- 84
- 80
That is the subject of a recent article in the American Sociological Review (PDF attached; see below for citation).
Thinking of Trump, the authors want to better understand what makes him seem authentic or trustworthy to certain voters despite the fact that he sometimes deliberately says things those voters know to be false. The question is essentially: why don't those falsehoods diminish his credibility?
They carry out an experiment to try to test a theoretical hypothesis, but I thought it would be interesting to see if Trump supporters here consider the conclusions they reach to be valid. To paraphrase, they argue that rather than causing Trump to lose credibility, those deliberate lies become further evidence of his authenticity to those voters because they perceive the lies in the context of a larger crisis of political illegitimacy. That is, they perceive Trump to be challenging an illegitimate political order, and his tactics justified by that context.
The authors describe the perception of illegitimacy (in general) like this:
1) Hahl, Oliver, Minjae Kim, and Ezra Sivan. 2018. "The Authentic Appeal of the Lying Demagogue:
Thinking of Trump, the authors want to better understand what makes him seem authentic or trustworthy to certain voters despite the fact that he sometimes deliberately says things those voters know to be false. The question is essentially: why don't those falsehoods diminish his credibility?
They carry out an experiment to try to test a theoretical hypothesis, but I thought it would be interesting to see if Trump supporters here consider the conclusions they reach to be valid. To paraphrase, they argue that rather than causing Trump to lose credibility, those deliberate lies become further evidence of his authenticity to those voters because they perceive the lies in the context of a larger crisis of political illegitimacy. That is, they perceive Trump to be challenging an illegitimate political order, and his tactics justified by that context.
The authors describe the perception of illegitimacy (in general) like this:
"these crises involve three groups: (1) a political establishment; (2) an incumbent group who sees itself as the “real people” (Müller 2016) but has been losing power; and (3) a group of erstwhile outsiders who are rising and whom the incumbent group views as being unfairly favored by the establishment." (8)
"Such a power-devaluation crisis thus creates conditions under which a traditionalist or right-wing lying demagogue should have authentic appeal. The logic is the same as in a representation crisis, but now the demagogue is challenging new norms rather than existing ones, and he is arguing that the establishment is illegitimate because it has betrayed the values and interests of an incumbent group that had previously held sway for appropriate reasons. Again, the demagogue will seem more of an authentic champion insofar as her norm-breaking induces the (new) establishment to denigrate her, thus making her seem more committed to the aggrieved constituency than is a candidate who does not flagrantly break (the new) norms." (9)
Please ignore the apparently pejorative connotations of "lying demogogue", they give the term a somewhat more technical gloss, but I'm interested in whether this narrative makes sense to people who identify as Trump supporters. Is Trump "an authentic champion" because he breaks norms (i.e. of political correctness, or etc.)? Do you consider yourself to be a member of a group that is losing relative status or power to other less deserving groups of people? If you disagree with the authors, what do you think they get wrong?"Such a power-devaluation crisis thus creates conditions under which a traditionalist or right-wing lying demagogue should have authentic appeal. The logic is the same as in a representation crisis, but now the demagogue is challenging new norms rather than existing ones, and he is arguing that the establishment is illegitimate because it has betrayed the values and interests of an incumbent group that had previously held sway for appropriate reasons. Again, the demagogue will seem more of an authentic champion insofar as her norm-breaking induces the (new) establishment to denigrate her, thus making her seem more committed to the aggrieved constituency than is a candidate who does not flagrantly break (the new) norms." (9)
1) Hahl, Oliver, Minjae Kim, and Ezra Sivan. 2018. "The Authentic Appeal of the Lying Demagogue:
Proclaiming the Deeper Truth about Political Illegitimacy." American Sociological Review, 83(1):1-33.
