ABSTRACT
The theory of political disaffection promises a new approach to the analysis of the relationship between citizens and the polity. According to Montero, Gunther, and Torcal (1997b: 136), political disaffection is usually treated as a kind of syndrome, the most often cited symptoms of which are disinterest, inefficacy, unresponsiveness, cynicism, distrust, distance, separation, estrangement, powerlessness, frustration, rejection, hostility, alienation; more specifically, disaffection ‘alludes to a more or less diffuse set of feelings as a result of which political affairs are seen as distant, unimportant, or meaningless’. These authors also contend that these attitudes may be independent of evaluations of political performance and overall support for democracy.1 They suggest, moreover, that while disaffection is typical of new democracies, it may also be observed in established democracies. Norway is, by any standards, a mature democracy. Moreover, the country is very prosperous in per capita income terms and suffers from only very limited internal conflicts. Since the theory of political disaffection has been developed in the context of democracies which are potentially less stable and experience more pronounced internal conflicts than we have in Norway, examination of the Norwegian case may prove very enlightening if one wants to know how far the theory goes.
