The Two Faces of (Post)Materialism: A Decomposition Approach

Inglehart's postmaterialism thesis always steered controversy. This paper focuses on the internal consistency of the thesis by arguing that (post)materialism has two faces. It is demonstrated that unfolding the Inglehart index into two separate indices leads to the finding of differential effects of education and cohort. Only the issues of "giving people more say" versus ‘maintaining order’ are autonomously related to cohort. Cohort differences as far as ‘protecting freedom of speech’ and ‘fighting rising prices’ are concerned are virtually completely levelled of after controlling for education and marital status. Education proved to be the single most important covariate in explaining these issues.