Chinese Journal of Sociology ›› 2018, Vol. 38 ›› Issue (1): 186-214.

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Political Trust,Social Network and Protest Potential: An Empirical Comparison of Fifty-Three Countries and Regions around the World

CHEN Xingying, WANG Heng   

  1. 1. Library, Party School of the Central Committee of C. P. C;School of International Studies, Peking University;
    2. School of Marxism Studies, The National Academy of Development and Strategy, Renmin University of China
  • Online:2018-01-20 Published:2018-01-20
  • Supported by:

    This study is supported by the Major Project of the Chinese Ministry of Education's Key Research Institutes of the Humanities and Social Sciences in the title of "Social Governance and Public Service Study"(16BZZ003).

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Abstract:

Based on the data from the World Values Survey(WVS) wave 6 (2010~2014),this article applies the multilevel mixed-effects logistic regression model to explore the influence factors of protest potential. An analysis of more than 70 000 samples from 53 countries and regions around the world indicates that individual protest potential is determined by both micro-level and macro-level variables. On micro-level,personal social network and political trust have an effect on individual protest tendency. The quantitative analysis shows strong positive correlation between social network and protest potential,while the effect of political trust on protest potential is not definitive. The finding supports resource mobilization theory in organizational sociology that provides a better explanation of protest potential in comparison to collective behavior theory in social psychology. On macro-level,polity type exerts impact on individual protest potential. Citizens under democratic regimes are more prone to protest than those under authoritarian regimes. In authoritarian countries,the group with strong social networks and low political trust exhibits the highest probability of protesting,while in democracies,those with strong social networks and high political trust are most likely to protest. It is a clear indication that regime type inserts influence on micro-level factors affecting protest potential. In conclusion,in democracies,political trust promotes people's engagement in protests,and social protests demonstrate institutionalized characteristics of high density with low intensity. In authoritarian countries,people resort to protest mainly because of their distrust in the authority,therefore social protests have non-institutionalized characteristics of low density with high intensity.

Key words: political trust, polity type, social network, protest potential