Political Alienation: A Conceptual Reassessment

How should we conceptualise and measure the estrangement of citizens who doubt both that their participation matters and that the system plays by legitimate rules? The literature has referred to this phenomenon as political alienation, yet the concept lacks a precise identification of necessary dimensions within the multidimensional framework, and explicit boundaries distinguishing alienation from related phenomena. This paper offers a conceptual reassessment of political alienation. I define political alienation as a durable condition of estrangement from the political system that arises when citizens embrace perceptions of powerlessness and normlessness towards the system. The concept is non-compensatory where political alienation occurs only when both dimensions are present, as a strong sense of one cannot offset the absence of the other. The paper further draws a theoretical distinction between politically alienated citizens and adjacent groups, such as critical and populist citizens. Analysis of the European Social Survey (Round 11) displays that this conceptualization classifies approximately 40% of the sample as politically alienated, a proportion that remains stable across survey rounds. The analysis also indicates that politically alienated citizens are less satisfied with democracy and markedly less likely to vote, suggesting that political alienation leads to both attitudinal estrangement and behavioral withdrawal.