Lucas Brook and Darren Hawkins, Department of Political Science
Downtown Lima, Peru is as metropolitan a place as one can find. Buses and cars blare their horns as they jostle for position on crowded streets. People brush shoulders as they weave their way though the crowds that fill streets dedicated entirely to pedestrian traffic. Suddenly, the air is filled with shouts and the sting of tear gas. Police emerge from every direction as piles of trash are ignited in the street. Protesters hurl bricks as they flee the clouds of gas and advancing officials. What changed? What drove these seemingly peaceful people to such seemingly extreme actions? And why was everyone else so calm? Protest had become so commonplace that the reaction of the average citizen was little more than a complaint in the delay of public transportation.
For the past two years I have been engaged in research focused on the political attitudes of Peruvian citizens. The political history and landscape in Peru provides a unique study of political behavior. Of all of Latin America, Peru has a citizenry that is perhaps the most skeptical of its government. This fact is even more fascinating given Peru’s political stability relative to other nations in the region. While some Peruvians participate through established institutional channels such as voting, campaigning or contacting political leaders, many others choose to engage in community improvement activities, private organization undertakings, or public protests as their avenue of political participation (Booth and Seligson 2009). Witnessing protests in Lima sparked my interest in these forms of “extra-governmental activism.” After initial research, I developed a hypothesis: extra-governmental activism was more common among citizens with less political knowledge. I hypothesize that Peruvians with less political knowledge (actual or perceived) understand (or at least perceive that they understand) less about Peru’s democratic institutions. Therefore, they will forgo participation through these established government institutions and employ extra-governmental means when participating politically.
I tested my hypothesis using data from Peru collected by Vanderbilt University’s Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) as part of their Americas Barometer study. I performed several regression analyses targeted at identifying the relationship between political knowledge and multiple forms of extra-governmental activism. To control for other factors that may influence extra-governmental activism, I included numerous control variables in my regressions. These controls included gender, age, education, religious affiliation, race, political ideology, interest in politics, corruption victimization (having personal experiences with corruption), and geographic region.
I found that, while political knowledge (both perceived and actual) has a statistically significant effect on the likelihood that a person voted, it did not have a significant effect on an his/her likelihood to sign a petition or participate in a protest. Interestingly, when it comes to involvement in community improvement organizations not directly affiliated with the government, a person’s perceived political knowledge has a statistically significant effect on their likelihood to participate while actual political knowledge does not. The more a person thinks he/she knows about politics (regardless of what he/she actually knows), the more likely they are to become involved in a community improvement group.
Ultimately, the research I performed produced some unexpected results. Interestingly, there is a statistically significant difference between what people think they know about politics and what they actually know about politics. Although this was not the initial focus of this study, it is perhaps the most intriguing result. Further research into the intricacies of the relationship between actual and perceived political knowledge could provide insight into topics of political science ranging from voting behavior to civic education programs. While my research did not support my hypothesis, the findings that I produced are beneficial to both the academic community at BYU and to my personal education. I am grateful for the opportunity that the ORCA grant offered me to perform this research.