Life satisfaction and the conventionality of political participation: The moderation effect of post-materialist value orientation
| Author | Edmund W Cheng,Hiu-Fung Chung,Hoi-wa Cheng |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/01925121211006567 |
| Published date | 01 March 2023 |
| Date | 01 March 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Original Research Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/01925121211006567
International Political Science Review
2023, Vol. 44(2) 157 –177
© The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/01925121211006567
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Life satisfaction and the
conventionality of political
participation: The moderation
effect of post-materialist
value orientation
Edmund W Cheng , Hiu-Fung Chung
and Hoi-wa Cheng
City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Abstract
Does life satisfaction (LS) predict people’s likelihood of participating in politics? Although the relationship
between LS and political participation (PP) has been widely debated, its correlation and causality remain
inconclusive. We contribute to the literature by exploring the moderation effect of post-materialist value
orientation. By conceptualizing the conventionality of PP as a continuous spectrum, we suggest a new
typology beyond the dichotomous understanding. Seventh-wave data from the World Values Survey in
Hong Kong indicate that individuals who are more dissatisfied with their lives are more likely to engage
in radicalized actions such as strikes and boycotts. This negative relationship is particularly strong among
people with a post-materialist orientation, yet LS is not related to electoral participation and normalized
actions, including peaceful demonstrations commonly regarded as ‘unconventional’ in previous studies.
Furthermore, the results of propensity score matching reinforce the causal claim that LS predicts radicalized
action negatively.
Keywords
Life satisfaction, political participation, protest, post-materialism, World Values Survey, Hong Kong
Introduction
From France’s Yellow Jackets and Chile’s Social Outbreak to Hong Kong’s Anti-extradition
Movement, many countries and regions have seen an increase in unconventional political actions.
Whereas citizens demand greater government accountability, institutionalized political freedom, or
fairer economic distribution instead of regime change, this wave of global activism often expresses
Corresponding author:
Hiu-Fung Chung, Department of Public Policy, City University of Hong Kong, Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon, Hong Kong.
Email: hfchung@cityu.edu.hk
1006567IPS0010.1177/01925121211006567International Political Science ReviewCheng et al.
research-article2021
Original Research Article
158 International Political Science Review 44(2)
moderate demands through radical means. Protestors tend to abandon conventional forms of politi-
cal participation (PP) and favor unconventional tactics to make their claims. Are they motivated by
materialistic concerns or nonmaterialistic concerns? What subjective conditions predict their
increasingly unconventional actions and the likelihood of moderate PP?
The relationship between life satisfaction (LS) and PP has long been examined, but the findings
remain inconclusive. Scholars disagree on the directions and conditions of such correlations and
whether there is a causal link between the two variables (Flavin and Keane, 2012). Recent litera-
ture has examined what and how particular political values contribute to fostering protest actions
in different logics of action (Grasso and Giugni, 2019). This article addresses the research gap by
examining the moderating role of post-materialism (PM) in how LS influences different modes of
PP at the individual level. We also contend that whether a particular mode of PP is ‘unconventional’
or ‘conventional’ depends on a normative framework in a given societal context, which is influ-
enced by at least three factors: risk of participation; cost of action; and public acceptance of certain
political acts. By arguing the conventionality of PP as a continuous spectrum, we suggest a new
typology beyond the dichotomous conception, highlighting three ideal-typical modes of PP: elec-
toral participation; normalized action; and radicalized action.
This article selects Hong Kong, a semiautonomous region of the People’s Republic of China
(PRC), as its case study. The increase in political activism in Hong Kong has caused some observ-
ers to consider Hong Kong ‘a nascent movement society’ and ‘a city of protests,’ where its protest
tactics have widely been referenced abroad (Cheng, 2016; Dapiran, 2017). It is therefore impera-
tive to explore which groups of citizens in this cosmopolitan city choose to engage in PP and what
motivates them to select different modes of PP. Inglehart (1977) argued that an individual’s eco-
nomic well-being and educational achievement foster cultural values of self-expression rather than
survival values, thereby increasing an individual’s willingness to engage in anti-establishment
politics. Given its economic prosperity and intensified political activism, Hong Kong is a compel-
ling case to examine the relationships among LS, PM and PP.
This article first reviews the extant literature on the relationships among LS, PM and PP and
discusses how the conventionality of PP is influenced by cost of participation, perceived risk of
action and public acceptance of such action. The article then elaborates on how to situate three
modes of participation in the Hong Kong context, thereby formulating specific hypotheses to
guide the empirical analysis. After outlining the variable operationalization and statistical proce-
dure, this article discusses the key findings and concludes with research implications about how
political values and sociopsychological constructs contribute to particular modes of PP in a non-
democratic context.
LS, PM and PP
Life satisfaction is defined as people’s subjective evaluation of their overall quality of life
(Veenhoven, 1988). As a sociopsychological construct, it has been repeatedly proven to be a sig-
nificant cognitive component that influences a wide range of social and political behaviors
(Lyubomirsky et al., 2005). The relationship between LS and PP has been extensively studied, yet
its directionality and causality are inconclusive in the extant literature (Bahry and Silver, 1990;
Barnes and Kaase, 1979; Lorenzini, 2014). Admittedly, the problem of two-way causation is not
specific to the investigation of the relationship between PP and LS. To unpack these relationships,
recent research seeks methodological robustness by employing more sophisticated statistical treat-
ment (Pirralha, 2018), controlling variables that have been proven to be explanatory (Flavin and
Keane, 2012), and studying the contextual and conditional effects on how LS impacts people’s
political behaviors (Lorenzini, 2014).
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