Materialist and Post-Materialist Concerns and the Wish for a Strong Leader in 27 Countries

Authors

  • Marcus E. O. Lima
    Federal University of Sergipe, Sergipe, Brazil
  • Dalila X. de França
    Federal University of Sergipe, Sergipe, Brazil
  • Jolanda Jetten
    University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia
  • Cícero R. Pereira
    Federal University of Paraíba, João Pessoa, Brazil
  • Michael J. A. Wohl
    Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada
  • Inga Jasinskaja-Lahti
    University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
  • Ying-yi Hong
    Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
  • Ana Raquel Torres
    Federal University of Paraíba, João Pessoa, Brazil
  • Rui Costa-Lopes
    University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal
  • Amarina Ariyanto
    University of Indonesia, Jakarta, Indonesia
  • Frédérique Autin
    University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
  • Nadia Ayub
    Institute of Business Management, Karachi, Pakistan
  • Constantina Badea
    Université Paris Nanterre, Paris, France
  • Tomasz Besta
    University of Gdańsk, Gdańsk, Poland
  • Fabrizio Butera
    University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
  • Carole Fantini-Hauwel
    Research Center for Experimental, Clinical & Cognitive Psychopathology (MEANING), ULB, Brussels, Belgium
  • Gillian Finchilescu
    University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa
  • Lowell Gaertner
    University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA
  • Mario Gollwitzer
    Philipps University, Marburg, Germany
  • Ángel Gómez
    Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, UNED, Madrid, Spain
  • Roberto González
    Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile
  • Dorthe Høj Jensen
    Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
  • Minoru Karasawa
    Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan
  • Thomas Kessler
    University of Jena, Jena, Germany
  • Olivier Klein
    Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium
  • Laura Megevand
    ISCTE—University Institute of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal
  • Thomas Morton
    University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Maria Paola Paladino
    University of Trento, Trento, Italy
  • Tibor Polya
    Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
  • Tuuli Anna Renvik
    University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
  • Aleksejs Ruza
    Daugavpils University, Daugavpils, Latvia
  • Wan Shahrazad
    National University of Malaysia, Bangi, Malaysia
  • Sushama Shama
    Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra, India
  • Heather J. Smith
    Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, CA, USA
  • Ali Teymoori
    Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg, Germany
  • Anne Marthe van der Bles
    University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands

Abstract

There is evidence that democracies are under threat around the world while the quest for strong leaders is increasing. Although the causes of these developments are complex and multifaceted, here we focus on one factor: the extent to which citizens express materialist and post-materialist concerns. We explore whether objective higher levels of democracy are differentially associated with materialist and post-materialist concerns and, in turn, whether this is related to the wish for a strong leader. Testing this hypothesis across 27 countries (N = 5,741) demonstrated a direct negative effect of democracies’ development on the wish for a strong leader. Further, multi-level mediation analysis showed that the relation between the Democracy Index and the wish for a strong leader was mediated by materialist concerns. This pattern of results suggests that lower levels of democracy are associated with enhanced concerns about basic needs and this is linked to greater support for strong leaders.