Capital, Privilege and Political Participation

Abstract

Capital, Privilege, and Political Participation examines how privilege and people’s perceptions of it relate to their involvement in politics. It treats people’s stocks of economic, social and cultural capital as indicators of privilege as well as resources that help them engage with politics. It also argues that how people perceive privilege in society, their own lives and politics matters for their political participation. Using survey, interview and focus group evidence, the book shows that capital and perceptions of privilege do, indeed, relate to involvement in a host of political activities. Whilst political participation is a normal if not daily feature of many people’s lives, having more economic and cultural capital is associated with being more politically active. Perceiving the role of privilege in society is also linked to higher levels of participation, whilst perceiving privilege in politics is unsurprisingly associated with being less politically active. Questions abound about how, if at all, capital and perceptions of privilege are causally related to political participation, but the book concludes that getting involved in politics is a distinguished activity. Efforts to tackle these inequalities in participation should, according to the people who participated in the research, centre on outreach activities by political institutions, more extensive and consistent citizenship education, and the active opening up of politics to the population.