A wide range of people is characterized by specific values, worldviews, and goals that unite society. Such a phenomenon is called public opinion, which has an influential force on the development and course of the state and civilization. Researcher Speier studied this sphere and found out what exactly are the constituent characteristics of public opinion. It is necessary to analyze the researcher’s approach to this phenomenon and determine whether the path to the majority opinion changed or was always the same.
The opinion of a large group of people can be very fuzzy and difficult to define since the people give rise to different approaches to life and vectors of thoughts. Nevertheless, public opinion is commonly understood as the influence of the mass of people on the state and its policies to meet the population’s needs (Speier, 1950). In other words, public opinion is a state of mass consciousness, referred to as the public, to the facts of social reality that affect their needs and interests.
Speier singles out this phenomenon as characteristic of the middle class of society because it is this population group that has the objective ability to interpret the fundamental interests of the majority into specific goals (Speier, 1950). Several factors cause this:
- The middle class works mainly, so they know all the advantages and disadvantages of the current economic system and notice which needs are not being met (Speier, 1950). The rich type cannot be objective because it is characterized by constant financial stability, while the poor class, on the contrary, is characterized by economic decline.
- The middle class makes up most of the population since fewer rich people and fewer poor people. In addition, the middle-class develops society by working in organizations and corporations, providing deposits and loans to the banking system (Speier, 1950).
- The type of problems and interests characteristic of the middle class is widespread throughout society and has no uniqueness or foreignness (Speier, 1950). It means issues of the rich will always be irrelevant to the middle and poor, and the same is true of the poor. On the contrary, the goals of the middle class are valuable and relevant to all strata.
Summarizing all the arguments, Speier explains the relationship between the phenomenon of public opinion and the middle class by the prevalence and competence of the social group in question in its present situation (Speier, 1950). Competence, in turn, is provided directly by the lifestyle of this class, which is maximally connected to the politics and economy of the state.
This approach to public opinion has not always been relevant. Before the French Revolution, the generally accepted position was distrusting the masses, caused by widespread uneducation, superstition, and prejudice. According to the early writers, objective public opinion was held only by the representatives of religion and the church and by the heads of state and the court entourage (Kollman, 2020). This approach gave rise to a chain of dependencies in which the wealthy class, such as the clergy and the upper class, ruled the state based on interests relevant to a narrow circle of people (Kollman, 2020). The revolution did not completely change the approach to public opinion, it forced a reassessment of worldviews and initiated the formation of a middle class.
Nevertheless, the final emergence of public opinion would not have been possible without new ways of expressing general will. The fact is that the media and freedom of speech are vital resources for forming and promoting such opinions (Kollman, 2020). The press ensures that most of society is informed and educated while allowing for analysis. However, to use the media, such as buying newspapers or computers, requires money and a certain education level, which the poor class cannot afford, while it is irrelevant to the rich class (Kollman, 2020). Freedom of speech allows this opinion to be expressed with impunity.
References
Kollman, K. (2020). Outside lobbying. Public opinion and interest group strategies. Princeton University Press.
Speier, H. (1950). Historical Development of Public Opinion. American Journal of Sociology, 55(4), 376-388. Web.