Americans Political and Patriotic

With less than two weeks to go before the US presidential election, most Americans are not switched off or fatigued by politics - a result which may surprise more cynical and weary Europeans, according to a poll by integrated marketing communications agency Euro RSCG Worldwide.

The study, 'Prosumer Pulse 2004: A Global Study-Anticipating Consumer Demand', was conducted online in October and surveyed 2,000 US respondents and more than 13,000 across the globe. It finds that most Americans (60.7%) say they are not frustrated with politics, vs. 20.3% who are and 18.9% who are neutral. Of those that said they are frustrated, and no longer vote in most elections, most are likely to be women, the young and/or those with less education.

A majority of US respondents (55.4%) felt it was irresponsible not to vote in elections - very similar to the 55.6% who say they 'care about politics', and similar to the proportion who actually do vote. However, younger voters are less likely to think that not voting is irresponsible (46.3% of those aged 18-34 vs 73.6% of those aged over 55%).

60% say they go to the trouble of learning about each candidate's agenda, with higher proportions among men, older voters and those with a college education. More than two thirds of Americans (68.6%) agreed that they deeply identify with their country, while just 9.8% disagreed. None of the other five countries surveyed came close to this level of agreement. Identification with one's country increases as income and age increase, but is not dependent on level of education.

Interest in politics does not appear to translate into political activity in many cases. Among American respondents, only 44.9% have attended a town meeting and 24.9% have protested or rallied for a cause.

Among other findings, nearly 50% of Americans say they do not trust the media per se, but do trust specific anchors or columnists, while more than a third (35.4%) say they now get a lot of their information from 'unofficial' sources on the Internet - such as 'blogs'. Most respondents, 55.5%, said they have a group of trusted media sources, but they also 'scavenge' for information elsewhere.

Ira Matathia, MD of Euro RSCG Worldwide's New York office, suggests that patriotism (not necessarily tied to support of the sitting president) is a different, and stronger phenomenon in the US from that in other areas surveyed: 'What we do know from our ongoing research is that, at a time when Americans continue to feel threatened and misunderstood in a chaotic and violent world, feelings of solidarity among the US populace appear to have grown deeper. That's one of the things that sets this nation apart. These feelings are manifesting themselves in more interest on the part of Americans in politics and in voting'.

Euro RSCG Worldwide is headquartered in New York and is the largest unit of communications group Havas. Its web site is at www.eurorscg.com

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.