Political Culture, Political System Characteristics, and Public Policies Among the American States

Daniel Elazar's typology of political culture is updated for all states for 1980 using religious affiliation data. On average, the political culture indices do not vary much from simitar measures constructed for 1906–1936. The effects of political culture on state politics and policy are tested in two ways: (1) by calculating partial correlation coefficients for ten dependent variables holding four environmental variables constant (affluence, industrialization, fertility, and liberal political ideology), and (2) by estimating regression equations within two categories of political culture (individualistic and traditionalistic) to gauge the indirect or contextual effects of culture. The partial correlation analysis yields the expected outcome—moralistic states have more interparty competition, higher voter turnout, more policy-relevant parties, and more liberal and innovative policies; traditionalistic states show the opposite result. The attempt to assess the contextual effects of political culture proves less satisfactory. No such effects appear for about half the dependent variables, and the contextual effects that are found correspond only in part to expectations.