to probe this matter in detail. Everything else being equal, however,
attitudes toward life correspond very well to the expectations we have
about leftist and rightist views of society.
Can we say something more, globally, about these persons who place
themselves on the left and on the right and who, collectively, harbor
coherent views about equality, politics, education, and life? Table2.5
presents some socio-economic correlates of left–right self-placement.
Our results show that women have a slight tendency to be less on
the right than men. This relationship must be interpreted prudently,
not only because it is weak, but also because the global pattern masks
a number of countervailing trends. In the past, women were more on
the right than men, probably because they were also more religious. In
recent generations, the pattern has been reversed, to create a gender
gap between more progressive women and more conservative men.
In new democracies, on the other hand, older women may be more to
the left than men and than younger women. Politically, these different
trends are significant and make gender an important dimension of
electoral strategies. Added up, as they are in our limited test, current
trends more or less cancel each other out.^16 Still, generational patterns
suggest that in the long run a gender gap will persist, with women
more to the left than men.^17
Age is significantly associated with left–right self-placement. In
advanced democracies, in particular, the younger generations tend to be
more to the left than the older cohorts. In post-communist countries,
Table 2.5.Relationships between socio-economic attributes and
left–right self-placement, on a world scale, 1999–2001
Sex (Male: 1; Female: 2) 0.008*
Age 0.012
Highest educational level attained, from no formal
education (1) to university-level with degree (9) 0.043
Income 0.010**
Note:Significant at 0.05 level (), at 0.01 level (), or at 0.001 level ().
Source:World Values Survey.
(^16) Norris,Electoral Engineering, pp. 116–18.
(^17) Ronald Inglehart and Pippa Norris,Rising Tide: Gender Equality and Cultural
Change around the World, Cambridge University Press, 2003, pp. 98–100.
46 Left and Right in Global Politics