The Concept of Public Opinion - Essay Example

The concept of public opinion The concept of public opinion traces its origin to eighteenth century and started acquiring significance through urbanization, other political and social forces and what people thought as forms of political contention changed. The concept was developed through theories and works of many eminent people. The British writer Jeremy Benthom was the first to fully develop theories of public opinion. According to his summary, public opinion had the power that ensures the rulers to rule for the greatest happiness. The German sociologist Ferdinand Tonnies (1922) stresses the importance of pubic opinion by equating the function of public opinion in societies to that of religion in communities. Another famous German philosopher Jurgen Habermas introduced the concept of public sphere to public opinion by defining universal access, rational debate and disregard for rank as the features necessary to elicit true public opinion. Public opinion can be termed as the combination of individual attitudes or beliefs held by common people. It is formed when people have in common a set of values, beliefs, traditions and attitudes of any issue. It takes shape as an outcome of information interpretation, evaluation, debates and rational discourse. Propaganda, advertising and media can influence public opinion. Walter Lippman (1921) says that public opinion in the present world is indeed the manufacture of consent in the practice of democracy as it allows greater control over the public opinion about the world and the other public interests. He says that this is necessary as the common concerns of the public can be gathered only through careful data collection and analysis, which many find uninteresting or find themselves incapable of doing. Another notion given to public opinion is as a form of collective behavior made up of those who discuss a public issue at a given time. This was proposed by American Sociologist Herbert Blumer and according to him, as people participate in forming opinions about issues at varying degrees, public opinion about an issue can not be taken as the opinion of the entire public. Public opinion is formed in many ways. One important tool in mass media .It actively spreads information, exert influences and reflects public opinions too. The individuals comprising the public interpret and evaluate the information provided to them before forming an opinion. According to Jurgen and Habermas (1962), the transition from absolute regime to liberalist democratic was associated with the rise of mass media. He thought that the society has increasingly polarized in to the spheres of public authority. Along with this, it was associated with the state and political activity. But with the invent of mass media which initially comprised of print media alone but now a days consists of numerous modes of communication to the people from television to internet, a third sphere namely a public sphere has emerged. In public sphere people discuss, debate and evaluate the contemporary issues. Their opinion can act as regulatory mechanism over the administration and also as a catalyst that can replace the regime in a democratic state. But information from the media are not taken up by the public as such and a lot of events precede the formation of an opinion. Thompson (1995) writes, ``Media messages are commonly discussed by individuals in the course of reception and subsequent to it... the messages are transformed through a process. This process’s filled with retelling and interpretation. The commentary, laughter and criticism will help in the transformation. By taking hold of messages and routinely incorporating them into our lives.. People constantly hone and enhance their skills and stocks of knowledge. This is done by testing the feelings and tastes and thus increasing the horizons of experience. When they don’t have direct contact with the situation, they rely on media to explore about the situation on their own. Politics is one such example. While the advancements in technology has helped the public to access information happening anywhere in the globe instantly, the heavy commercialization of the media has made it to become merely a tool for political manipulation, largely dependent to satisfy advertisers, readers and institutions. The readership took a quantum jump when compared to the pre-industrial period. The message conveyed to the masses also has changed now. Due to this polarization of the public sphere, public will be exempted from political discussions. The increased connectivity between the people through Internet and technology advances is capable of playing a role in reclaiming the public sphere for liberal democratic debate. These have become an active field for the public also to voice their opinion. With respect to political arena, the major players who influence public opinion are influential political and economic organizations and forces - political parties, trade unions and professional organizations. Public opinion in the political area is formed by the common core political values which shape the attitudes as well. People understand the political values with the help of political socialization. Several socializing catalysts can influence the political values. Family, school, peers, mass media and social groups are such values. If both parents are of same party, children tend to follow their identification. The respect towards the democratic processes in the young people can be developed by familiarizing them with public figures out side the family. The attributes like gender, race, and religion also up to some extent are capable of influencing the political values. The conformity and social influence can be termed as the basic psychological mechanism that forms the social opinion. The political socialization can be termed as unique for every one in the society. There exist some common attributes in the people coming from similar social atmospheres. Social and economic status is composite measure of an individual’s education, income and occupation. Though there will be some exceptions, generally the highly educated and professionally highly occupied individuals are politically conservative in nature. When compared with lower educational and income people the higher professionals are more politically conservative. http://www.democraticaudit.com/british_democracy/publicopinion.php ) In representation of public opinion, the general debates and discourses have significant importance. Due to this importance, ordinary people find an opportunity to air their views feely on any subject they like and choose. They may be the private topics or the topics of the national interest. When administration arranges special enquiries by certain committees, they form an useful forum. These forums can make the interests and opinions of the people heard. For democratic governments, gauging public opinion is of paramount importance. The right to govern is hard-wired in the consent of the governed. The reasons may range from basis polls to measure the public opinion to normative ones. The public opinion may avoid over through or may result in governing rightly and justly. It was established that the public opinion couldn’t be formed without communication and social interaction. As a result the current research on sociology and psychology is being focused on different ways, the individuals can interact. The interaction of the individual with the wider community makes the public opinion formation possible. Previously the popular attitudes were not used to be surveyed, when mass media did not introduce the straw polls. This term refers the direction of political winds. The development of new statistical techniques resulted in scientific research into the public opinion. This started from 1930 onwards. In the present scenario, public opinion polls assume huge significance in the run up to an Presidential election process and on the governance of the current regime. Print, visual media and political parties engage in opinion polls to measure public mood. The selection of interviewees in a survey by random method is the thing that gives every person an equal chance of being interviewed. There surveys can have a margin of error and the results depend on the wideness of the population base selected and number of the interviewees selected. If the polls are poorly designed, they lead to inadequate and inaccurate findings that mislead the public opinion. There is a chance of inaccuracy if the selected interviewees are is not random and the questions are biased. When public feels on an issue the polls conducted will provide a dipstick survey. The result is that what the public feels at that moment. These cannot be relied completely as it takes time for public opinion to become stable or some cases it is always not stable. The people’s perceptions change according to their needs and contexts. However, now days most of the public don't exhibit a keen interest in politics and expressed a general distrust of government officials and develop a cynicism about politics and government. Many people feel alienated and disconnected from the governments. The above-mentioned causes are the things that are capable of making discontent grow. When the political processes mix with government processes and money lobbying, they will be frustrated to the people. The influence of money in politics and hidden distrust regarding political leasers that comes from the events from the type of situation in Iraq. The officials from the government use the polls as one form of response regarding public opinion. This aids them to measure the intensity and saliency of the public’s policy and their intentions. By talking to voters in constituency, reading their mails, listening to interest groups, interpreting the election results, relying on own political instincts and values are the ways that can swing public opinion in one’s favor. When the leadership thinks that the public opinion is not enough substantial regarding their stand, they can change their stand on the issues and can convey to the public to the media. This can bring a substantial change in the minds of public. Though political parties need public opinion to win and design their policies and frameworks, they solely don't depend on public opinion poll results. The disinterest of the majority of the public helps them to manipulate the public opinion. (Democracy in America, n.d) People generally feel excluded from the present political process and their disinterest in current politics is well established by a recent finding in UK. In 2004 in UK the researchers working for UK electoral commission selected some people drawn from various walks of life. This is done to know the voter’s apathy towards the political participation. The results have drawn them back in incorporating the outcomes into the official findings. Interestingly majority of people thanked them for taking their view. 90 percent of the people said that they should have enough power to effect the policies of the government. Only one third of the people feel that they have the power out of those people who wanted that power. Two thirds of the people taken into consideration felt that they enjoy no power that can effect the government policies. This astonished the researchers and they avoided the inclusion of the findings into official outcomes. (Democratic Audit Human Rights Center, 2006) In this context, Walter Lippman's view of manufacturing consent with regards to representing public opinion assumes significance. When the political parties try to cite public opinion as the main reason behind their policy initiatives and actions and when no strong public opinion emerges due to public apathy towards politics, it becomes easy for the parties to fabricate public opinion to support their actions. This is a major threat to the very existence of democracy. Also in areas where people do not have direct experience, they depend on other reliable sources to collect and present the facts to them. This aspect helps the political parties to fabricate and present information in a way that would be helpful to them. The public is influenced in to forming an opinion without realizing the untold facts. The true sense of democracy with equal representation loses its real significance here. But public opinion polls conducted in a systematic and scientific way gives the real voices and expectations of the public which may act as a scale for political parties to act and govern. The function of public does not stop with electing their representatives alone but bears fruit only when their representatives fulfill the faith and expectations imposed on them. The 2004 poll conducted in UK clearly gives the people's expectations from the government. The poll results show that British public is committed to the principles of accountable government, the rule of law , to a renunciation of the informality of Britain's old political arrangements. These arrangements range from the adoption of a written constitution and strong legal and formal security of executive conduct. This in turn they want to have more popular participation in decision making of the government. This should be proportional to the principle of elections. the majority of the people felt that there should be no problem in funding the political parties to avoid them to depend on the donations of the rich people. Parties even take donations from people, businesses and trade unions and that is capable of effecting their stand on various issues. The other defect the people interviewed pointed out that the political parties will accept only the views that are favorable to them. They will reject all the others doubting the authenticity of the poll. The above mentioned polls by the Rowntree Trust's State of the Nation Polls on democratic issues and their findings are not acceptable to the political class. They even try to reject the reliable findings of the Rowntree and polls similar to that type. The ground is that the democratic issues may well command high levels of support in street or telephone interviews. They feel that they do not have salience and importance in the mind of the people. The experiences of the psephologists is that the poll questions often determine the responses. They are capable of revealing contradictory and confused responses. Politicians will take the point of view that the concerns exhibited in the poll results do not show up in their focus groups. This gives a chance to the politicians to not accept the poll results. Another question worth considering is the amount of importance that should be attached to the public opinion. Though the public here refers to all voting age citizens, it consists of numerous subsets with each having an issue close to their heart and indifferent to the others. The issues posed by the public are very important when the practices of the democratic administration were being concerned. It is due to the fact that the members hold well defined opinions, whereas the public have the individuals who hold the opinions characterized by indifference. Among the voting public itself, some follow the political events carefully while others pay attention only during crucial times. Voters and non-voters bear different political beliefs and opinions about the same issue and context. This makes the officials to get two different messages. This difference depends on the public they chose to listen. The politicians also doubt the poll results base on this. This brings forth the question of considering the numerically significant but indifferent majority opinion into consideration. The opinions of smaller intense and those of minority are rarely concerned. (Democratic Audit Human Rights Center, 2006) The previous theorists emphasized the importance of public opinion in democratic administration. They felt that the public opinion restrain and guides the actions of the governmental institutions. They expected that the citizens would elect the persons who have similar and acceptable political views. In electing them they expect that the representatives, would enact the political opinions of electorate into government policies. This results in the government by the people. But today many observers tend to differ from the initial views on the importance of public opinion. When considering the present context the public opinion acts as the driving force behind government policy making. The citizens are compelled to take interest in political subjects and monitor the activities of their leaders critically. This will reasonably keep them well informed about the political events or issues. But this is not the case in majority of the places as people pay attention to political issues only during times of unusual significance or elections and in general care less about the current issues. Hence while the role of public opinion in policy making and other political issues is very limited, they exert a huge influence on the approval given to political leaders. For political leaders to be successful at least on a personal scale, winning a good public opinion is very crucial. The newsworthiness of the public opinion was being increased in the present context. The increase in number of organizations that conduct increased with the increase of technologies of survey and polling technology. As a result the public is also having a choice to air their opinions. Even the public officials are also seasoned poll users. Legislators keeping these developments in view want to send the questionnaires to the people of their constituency. Some appoint the political consultants, whose responsibilities include keeping track of the status of the public opinion in the candidate’s state or district. Hence rather than for policy making, public opinion carries a weightage for the political leaders even if the opinion is a manufactured one. References Chomsky, Noam & Herman, Edward (1988, 2002). Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. New York: Pantheon. 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