Political culture in Southeast Asia

This chapter looks at how political culture has shaped the understanding of politics in Southeast Asia. It presents some arguments surrounding citizen support for authoritarian government. The chapter not only lays out the evolution of the debates surrounding political culture in the region but also draws from existing surveys in Southeast Asia to show how relevant and accurate the theoretical arguments are today. It includes available empirical time series evidence. The survey findings are drawn from the Asian Barometer Surveys (ABS) conducted in eight Southeast Asian countries (Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam) from 2001 to 2016. The findings show that while political culture arguments continue to have resonance in Southeast Asian scholarship and public life, they fail to fully capture the diverse and changing attitudes and values of Southeast Asians in the contemporary era or the trajectory of how political culture is changing.