New article on Does Workplace Experience Enhance Political Participation? A Critical Test of a Venerable Hypothesis

A new article by Per Adman in Political Behavior

2008 Does Workplace Experience Enhance Political Participation? A Critical Test of a Venerable Hypothesis, Vol 30(1), pp. 115-138.

Abstract
Several schools of thought claim that citizens can develop their democratic skills at the workplace. Here I focus on the hypothesis put forward by Carole Pateman and by Sidney Verba and colleagues that state that by practicing civic skills and democratic decision-making at the workplace, citizens become more active in politics. I test the hypothesis with a nationally representative panel survey of the Swedish population. My findings contradict previous empirical research as no impact on political participation was discovered. I argue that the effects may have been overestimated in prior studies because the tests were based on cross-sectional data: insufficient care was taken with a number of significant methodological problems. The study points to the importance of using panel models when investigating the causes of political participation.

Keywords Political participation – Civic skills – Workplace participation – Participatory democracy – Panel data – Carole Pateman