ABSTRACT
Theories of universal values raise the interesting question of whether one really can find common values across countries. The theory of postmaterialism is based on this strict methodology for the attribution of values to people’s attitudes. Values are revealed by constraints on respondents’ answers to a whole host of attitudinal questions. In fact, the concept of postmaterialism has been so successful that entire groups of actors have begun to identify themselves as adherents of postmaterialist values. This chapter focuses on postmaterialism theory, trust theory and New Cultural Theory. The promise of cultural theory is attested to by Robert Putnam and his colleagues’ painstakingly careful work on Italian regional governance, the immense body of cross-national survey research that has been spawned by Ronald Inglehart’s seminal work on postmaterialism.
