Exploring the Intricacies of Citizens' Economic Inequality Perceptions and Their Redistributive Correlates: Ill-Informed, Attitudinally Incoherent, or Predictably Irrational?

This section will be concerned with addressing the frequently observed discrepancies between citizens' inequality evaluations and objectively measurable levels of income and wealth inequality as well as their political correlates with a particular focus on citizens' redistributive preferences. Irrespective of factual levels of economic inequality, citizens' inequality assessments result from a multitude of factors, at different levels of analyses, encompassing personal dispositions, individual information intake but also exposition to different inequality frames used by political actors and the media. What is more and contrary to plausibility assumptions, citizens' articulated preferences for redistributive public policies, such as policies targeting health, pensions, unemployment or social assistance, are less impacted by individual concerns with levels of inequality but vary rather in accordance with the target groups of the respective public policies (e.g., poor vs. rich, social beneficiaries vs. taxpayers, elderly vs. social security contributors) and distributive justice norms - equality, equity and need - associated with those policies. This section aims to enhance scholarly understanding of these persisting attitudinal intricacies and to outline promising interdisciplinary directions for future research. Despite long-standing scholarly research, social scientists continue to struggle to fully understand the multifaceted basis upon which citizens construct their perceptions of economic inequality and, subsequently, develop or align their preferences for redistributive policies. It has been demonstrated that more vocal demands by the citizenry for more redistribution do not evolve in lockstep with increasing or higher levels of economic inequality and thereby reinforce its persistence. As a result, this apparent attitudinal disconnect from economic indicators has significant implications for political stability and social cohesion, especially as a growing body of academic literature points to a range of adverse political and societal effects attributable to economic inequality. From this vantage point, it is of particular importance to broaden the disciplinary and methodological scope of analysis to assess the underlying causes, mechanisms and resulting consequences of this persisting mismatch. Perceptions of inequality, for instance, might, in part, derive from personal experiences and observations, and be complemented by reports on national or regional statistics discussed in the media, or from political frames addressing inequality more generally. Moreover, recent empirical studies suggest that personal dispositions, such as social dominance orientation, mediate individuals' receptiveness to inequality cues. Similarly, individual redistributive preferences also differ depending on the nature of social policies at stake, such as housing, education, unemployment or health, or, by a similar token, their underlying norms of distributive justice, such as equality, equity, or need provisions. Furthermore, recent studies suggest that citizens' attitudes towards the rich - in theory, the prime targets of the redistributive zero-sum 'game' - are quite ambivalent as they frequently tend to legitimize their fortunes or avoid to consider them altogether. Another promising research avenue in this realm of interest is put forward by empirical studies that focus on the role of emotions associated with different representations of economic inequality and their political correlates. Proposed section panels 1) This panel aims to examine and explain the multifaceted root causes of citizens’ inequality perceptions. It will particularly focus on the emotional, socioeconomic and political antecedents of inequality perceptions. Proposed panel chair: Sonja Zmerli. 2) This panel aims to discuss the interrelationships between inequality perceptions and redistributive preferences in view of the breadth of redistributive public policies and their associated distributive justice norms. Proposed panel chair: Arno van Hootegem. 3) This panel aims to enhance the understanding of the communicative, i.e. framing, strategies employed by political parties across the ideological spectrum and the media to discuss economic inequality and influence public opinion. Proposed panel chair: Daniel Walsh. 4) This panel aims to investigate the political consequences of inequality perceptions: Which are their repercussions for citizens’ voting behaviour, trust in political institutions and perceptions of political inclusion. Proposed panel chair: Silke Goubin. Bibliography: Cavaillé, C. (2023). Fair Enough? Demand for Redistribution In The Age of Inequality. Cambridge University Press. Condon, M., Wichowsky, A. (2020). The Economic Other. Inequality in the American Political Imagination. Chicago University Press. Van Hootegem, A., Meuleman, B., & Abts, K. (2023). Two faces of benefit generosity: comparing justice preferences in the access to and level of welfare benefits. European Sociological Review, 40(3), 523-534. https://doi.org/10.1093/esr/jcad053 Waldfogel, H. B., Sheehy-Skeffington, J., Hauser, O. P., Ho, A. K., & Kteily, N. S. (2021). Ideology selectively shapes attention to inequality. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118(14), e2023985118. https://doi.org/doi:10.1073/pnas.2023985118.