202 CHAPTER Six ■ The IndIvIdual
be h avi or, are these differences rooted in biology or are they learned from the culture?
Most feminists, particularly the constructivists, contend that these differences are
socially constructed products of culture and can thus be reconstructed over time. Yet,
once again, these general predispositions, what ever their origin, cannot explain extreme
variation in individual be hav ior.
the Impact of Public opinion on elites
The second possibility is that the masses have opinions and attitudes about foreign pol-
icy and international relations that are diff er ent from those of the elites. If public- opinion
polls capture these differences, will the elites listen to these opinions? Will policy made
by the elites reflect the public’s attitudes? Sometimes a public’s general foreign policy
orientation reflects a perceived general mood of the population that leaders can detect.
President George H. W. Bush was able to capitalize internationally on the positive
public mood in the aftermath of victory in the 1991 Gulf War, although the domestic
effect was short lived; he did not win reelection. Even leaders of authoritarian regimes
pay attention to dominant moods, with Chinese leaders curbing corruption at the local
and provincial level in response to public anger.
More often than not, however, publics do not express a single, dominant mood;
top leaders are usually confronted with an array of public attitudes. These opinions are
registered in elections, but elections are an imperfect mea sure of public opinion
because they merely select individuals for office— individuals who may share voters’
attitudes on some issues but not on others.
In most demo cratic regimes, public- opinion polling provides information about
public attitudes. The Eu ro pean Union, for example, conducts the Eurobarometer, a
scientific survey of public attitudes on a wide range of issues in Eu ro pean Union
(EU) countries. Because the same questions are asked during diff er ent polls over time,
state officials and the EU leadership can avail themselves of reliable data on public
opinion. Likewise, the Latin American Public Opinion Proj ect has conducted system-
atic surveys of Latin American citizens since the 1970s. And Afrobarometer polls con-
ducted since 2000 chart citizen attitudes on governance and economics in almost 35
countries. But do leaders fashion policy with these attitudes in mind? Do elites change
policy to reflect the preferences of the public? Data collected in 2014 on EU countries’
attitudes toward immigrants reflect wide variance of opinion. In Greece, 86 percent
supported fewer numbers of immigrants; in Spain, the number was 47 percent; Ger-
many, 44 percent, and Poland 40 percent. In Germany, 14 percent supported more
immigrants, while in Greece, only 1 percent did.^22 And, in the aftermath of the mas-
sive influx of refugees and asylum seekers in the summer of 2015, those opinion polls
conducted just a year earlier are likely to be unreliable. No won der the EU policy
makers have had such difficulty in fashioning an EU- wide policy.