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PUBLIC TRUST IN (OR CYNICISM ABOUT)OTHER NATIONS ACROSS TIME

Paul R. Brewer

This study uses survey data from 1994 and 1999 to examine the nature, causes, and

consequences of Americans generalized beliefs about other nations during the decadeprior to September 11, 2001a relatively sedate era in international relations com-pared to the Cold War and post-September 11 periods. As was the case after theterrorist attacks, relatively few citizens expressed high levels of trust in other nations;more did in 1999 than in 1994, however. Partisanship, beliefs about government, age,and education were related to trust in other nations at the individual level, with someof these relationships varying over time. Trust in other nations, in turn, was related topreferences for diplomacy and support for military interventions. The strength of theformer relationship varied over time, whereas the nature of the latter relationshipdepended on the nature of the intervention in question. The findings raise the questionof why so few Americans trust other nations not only during periods of external threat

but also during quieter times.

Key words: trust in other nations; foreign policy opinions; party identification; beliefsabout government.

In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, foreignpolicy has occupied a prominent place on the political agenda in the UnitedStates. In particular, decisions by American leaders regarding miltary inter-

ventions in Afghanistan and Iraq have been the focus of considerable publicattention and debate. According to recent research by Brewer et al. (2004),ordinary Americans use their generalized beliefs about how trustworthy othernations are to form opinions about such decisions. Public opinion about for-eign policy, in turn, can shape voting behavior and, ultimately, public policy

Paul R. Brewer, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Department of Journalism and MassCommunication, 117 Johnston Hall, P.O. Box 413, Wisconsin, Milwaukee ([email protected]).

Political Behavior, Vol. 26, No. 4, December 2004 ( 2004)

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(see, e.g., Aldrich, Sullivan, and Borgida, 1989; Holsti, 2004; Page andShapiro, 1992) Given all of this, it is important that we understand fully thenature, causes, and consequences of public trust in other nations. To date,however, our insights into these subjects come from a single and perhaps

distinctiveif admittedly crucialperiod: the post-September 11, 2001 era.In this study, I consider trust in other nations within a wider historicalcontext that includes three recent eras in American foreign affairs: the Cold

War era, which ended with the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union; the erabetween the Cold War and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001; andthe post-September 11, 2001 era studied by Brewer et al. (2004). The analysesthat follow concentrate on the second era, the relatively quiet middle one.My goal in examining this era is to extend our understanding of the nature,causes, and consequences of trust in other nations from a static portrait at one

moment in time to a dynamic portrait that spans different sorts of periods inworld affairs and explores change within one such period.I address specific three questions. The first revolves around the nature of

mass beliefs about other nations: is the American publics lack of trust in othernations during the post-September 11, 2001 era an aberration, or is wide-spread public cynicism about other nations the norm even during relativelysedate periods in world affairs? Brewer et al. (2004, p. 105) found that in theaftermath of the terrorist attacks most Americans saw the international realmas a dog-eat-dog world full of untrustworthy, self-interested nations.

Although I am not able to provide direct comparisons between this era andprevious eras, I do show that few Americans placed much trust in othernations even before the terrorist attacks.

The second question revolves around the causes of trust in other nations:what shaped such trust during the pre-September 11, 2001 period? To addressthis question, I examine how the nature of the international environment,partisan signals, generalized beliefs about government, and education influ-enced trust in other nations during the 1990s, both independently and inconjunction with one another. Doing so also allows me to consider whether

the basic structure of trust in other nations is constant across historical periodsand whether this form of trust responds to the nature of events within aparticular period. My findings here may have bearing on whether ordinarycitizens opinions about foreign policy in general (e.g., Holsti, 1992; Hurwitzand Peffley, 1987; Page and Shapiro, 1992; Peffley and Hurwitz, 1992) andtheir generalized beliefs about other nations in particular (Brewer et al., 2004)are coherent, reasonable, and even rational.

The third question revolves around the consequences of trust in othernations: how was such trust related to foreign policy opinions in the pre-Sep-tember 11, 2001 era? I not only test whether trust in other nations influencedkey opinions during this period; I also provide a solution to the puzzleposedby Brewer et al s (2004) resultsof how trust in other nations can be related to

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support for specific military interventions but not to abstract support for usingmilitary force to solve international problems. Addressing this problem may beparticularly useful given the centrality of when, why, and how to use militaryforce within American foreign policy (Jentleson and Britton, 1998, p. 395). As I

explain, the solution follows from the notion that the public distinguishesbetween different sorts of military interventions (Jentleson, 1992; Jentleson andBritton, 1998). By looking at support for interventions in the 1990s, I am able toexamine how trust in other nations is related to two contrasting types of militaryaction.

A HISTORICAL CONTEXT FOR STUDYING TRUST IN OTHER NATIONS

In studying generalized beliefs about other nations Brewer et al. (2004, p.

96) focus on what they call international trust, which they define as ageneralized belief about whether most foreign countries behave in accor-dance with normative expectations regarding the conduct of nations. As theyput it:

Citizens with high levels of international trust see the realm of world affairs as afriendly environment where trust and cooperation among nations are the norms; incontrast, citizens with low levels of international trust see the same realm as a hostileenvironment where all nations strive against one another for advantage and readilydefect from cooperative efforts. Put another way, international trust is a standing

decision to give other nations the benefit of the doubt, an assumption that mostcountries are of good will and benign intentions. (Brewer et al., 2004, p. 96)

In this account I focus on the same concept, which I refer to as trust inother nations, or, in its negative form, cynicism about other nations.

One might expect the publics generalized beliefs about world affairs to varyover time, given that the nature of world affairs itself varies considerably overtime. Consider, for example, the differences in world affairs across the threeperiods of interest here. During the first of these, the Cold War era, Americanforeign policy was organized around bipolar conflict between the UnitedStates and its allies, on the one hand, and the Soviet Union and its allies, onthe other. Looking at survey data from this period, Hurwitz and Peffley (1990)found that Americans used their images of the Soviet Unionin particular,their beliefs about whether it was trustworthy and whether it was threaten-ingas bases for forming foreign policy judgments ranging from, generalpostures (e.g., preferences for military strength) to specific foreign policyopinions (e.g., opinions about whether to provide aid to the Contras in Nic-aragua). The authors furthermore concluded that citizens can form coherentopinions about foreign policy, even in the absence of in-depth knowledgeabout the topic, by using their beliefs about foreign nations as heuristics (i.e.,information shortcuts). In a subsequent study they found that images of the

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Soviet Union became more positive in response to events in the late1980sevidence, they argued, of a public that also responds to events inreasonable ways (Peffley and Hurwtiz, 1992).

If Americans used bipolar conflict as their organizing framework for

understanding world affairs during the Cold War, then they may have con-nected their beliefs about the trustworthiness of the United States perceivedmain adversary to their beliefs about whether the realm of internationalrelations was, generally speaking, a friendly and cooperative one. Thus, onemight expect levels of trust in other nations to have been low during the Cold

War in light of the publics largely unfavorable evaluations of the Soviet Unionfrom the beginning of the Cold War to its end (see, e.g., Holsti, 2004). By thesame token, however, one might also expect such levels to have risen along

with political displays of, and public support for, detente in the late 1970s and

particularly in the mid to late 1980s (see, e.g., Page and Shapiro, 1992). AsBrewer et al. (2004) argue, citizens may update their generalized beliefs aboutother nations in response to changes in how threatening or secure the inter-national environment appears to be.

Of course, the end of the Cold War fundamentally altered the nature ofUnited States foreign affairs. In response, public opinion toward Hurwtiz andPeffleys (1990) enemy nation underwent a dramatic transformation.According to surveys conducted by the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations(CCFR), its mean feeling thermometer score on a scale from 1 to 100 rose

from 32 in 1986 to 59 in 1990 (Rielly, 1995). The same surveys showed thatperceptions of the Soviet (or Russian) military threat as a threat to UnitedStates declined substantially over this 4-year span (Rielly, 1995).

Public perceptions of world affairs in broader terms also changed along withthe international environment. Compared to the preceding period, the post-Cold War (but pre-September 11, 2001) period could be considered anunusually quiet and secure one in the history of American foreign relations. Tobe sure, world affairs hardly ground to a halt for the 10 years following 1991.For example, during this period the United States faced concerns over nuclear

proliferation in rogue nation North Korea (particularly from 1992 to 1994);it also undertook military interventions in Bosnia (culminating in a 1995deployment of troops) and Kosovo (in the form of a 1999 aerial bombardment)to prevent ethnic cleansing (see Jentleson and Britton, 1998). For a decade,however, United States faced neither a superpower adversary such as theSoviet Union nor a powerful and sustained threat from international terrorism.CCFR surveys captured a corresponding shift in the public agenda, with thepercentage of citizens citing foreign issues in response to questions aboutproblems facing the nation declining from 26% in 1986 to 17% in 1990, 12%in 1994, and just 7% in 1998 (Rielly, 1999).

Given all of this, one might expect the end of the Cold War to have hadconsequences for trust in other nations as well Specifically trust in other

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nations should have risen over the course of the 1990s as Americans updatedtheir worldviews in response to their quieter international environment. Sucha shift would be particularly interesting in light of the argument that the publicresponds to information about world affairs in understandable, predictable,

and reasonable ways (Page and Shapiro, 1992; Peffley and Hurwitz, 1992).Note that the hypothesis of increasing trust in other nations does not neces-sarily imply that trust in other nations should have become the norm. Nordoes it imply that trust in other nations should have been inconsequentialduring this period; if anything, the demise of bipolar conflict as an organizingframework could have pushed citizens toward greater reliance on their gen-eralized beliefs about other nation in forming their foreign policy principlesand opinions.

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 brought another transformation

in United States foreign affairs, one that revolved around a War on Terror.Once again, the publics perceptions of world affairs changed with the times.CCFR survey data show that the percentage of Americans citing foreign policyproblems surged from 7% in 1998 to 41% in 2002 (Bouton and Page, 2002).Moreover, they show that although concerns about Russias military powerhad dropped to record lows by 2002, concerns about threats from interna-tional terrorism, chemical and biological weapons, and the possibility ofunfriendly countries becoming nuclear powers all rose substantially (Boutonand Page, 2002). Thus, it is not surprising that Brewer et al. (2004) found low

levels of trust in other nations in late 2001 and early 2002, nor that anotherrecent study (Brewer, Aday, and Gross, 2005) concluded that trust in othernations had reached an even lower level by the summer of 2002.

THE CAUSES OF TRUST IN OTHER NATIONS

Having set the historical context for studying trust in other nations, I now turnto specific questions about its causes and consequences. First, I consider whatfactors might have influenced such trust in the relatively quiet era between the

Cold War and the War on Terror, as well as whether their impact varied overthe course of this era. Of course, the previous section emphasized one factor: thenature of the international environment itself. Given the decline of foreignpolicy problems as public concerns during this period (as evidenced by thepreviously mentioned CCFR results), I expected trust in other nations to havebeen greater in the late 1990s than in the early 1990s.

Another factor that may influence trust in other nations is age. Brewer et al.(2004) point to differential socialization experiences in explaining their post-September 11, 2001 finding that younger Americans placed more trust inother nations than did older ones: whereas the former came of age duringrelatively secure periods (the late Cold War and post-Cold War eras), thelatter came of age during relatively threatening periods (World War II and the



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early Cold War). Although I expected the same pattern across age for pre-September 11, 2001 beliefs about other nations, I also considered a novelhypothesis: namely, that age differences in trust in other nations should have

widened over the course of the 1990s. Younger citizens beliefs about other

nations may be more responsive to changes in the international environmentthan those of older citizens, given the general tendency of the young to haverelatively less crystallized, or fixed, belief systems (see, e.g., Markus, 1979;Sear, 1986). Thus, if Americans update their beliefs in response to theinternational environment and if younger citizens are more likely than oldercitizens to revise their generalized beliefs, then younger citizens should havebeen particularly likely to shift toward greater trust in other nations over thecourse of 1990s.

A third factor that may shape trust in other nations is another sort of

generalized belief: beliefs about government. A growing body of literatureshows that citizens use such beliefs as information shortcuts in formingopinions about a range of political topics (e.g., Hetherington, 1998, 1999).According to Hetherington and Globetti (2002), for example, citizens use trustin government as a decision rule in deciding whether to favor governmentactions that may benefit others at ones own cost. Along similar lines, studieshave shown that trust in government fosters support for involvement in worldaffairs (Brewer et al., 2004; Popkin and Dimock, 2000) Of particular relevancehere, though, is Brewer et al.s (2004) finding that citizens who placed trust in

government after September 11, 2001 were more likely than their politicallycynical peers to place trust in other nations during that period. Those whobelieve that their own government does not fulfill their normative expecta-tions, they write may reason that other nations are unlikely to do so either(p. 97); by the same logic, citizens who extend trust to their own governmentmay be particularly willing to do the same for other governments.

Still, Brewer et al.s (2004) findings came from a period when trust ingovernment not only reached unusually high levels (see, e.g., Brewer, Aday,and Gross, 2003; Hetherington and Nelson, 2003) but was also likely to have

been unusually salient to citizens, given the dominance of patriotic and pro-government messages during the aftermath of the terrorist attacks. Thus, itwould be useful to test whether beliefs about government also shaped trust inother nations during a periodsuch as the 1990sthat was not only quieter interms of world affairs but also characterized by more cynical beliefs aboutgovernment (Hetherington and Nelson, 2003).

Signals from partisan elites may shape the publics generalized beliefs aboutother nations, as well. According to Zaller (1992), citizens form their opinionsin part on the basis of messages from elites on their end of the partisanspectrum; as a result, contrasts between the signals of Republican andDemocratic elites should be reflected in contrasts between the opinions ofRepublican and Democratic partisans Applying Zallers model to the case at

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hand, Republican partisans should tend to follow Republican elites signalsabout whether to trust other nations while rejecting Democratic elites signalsregarding the same subject; Democratic partisans, in turn, should tend to do

just the opposite. Brewer et al. (2004, p. 96) draw on this argument to account

for their post-September 11, 2001 finding that Republicans placed less trust inother nations than did Democrats; during this period, they argue, signals fromRepublican leaders regarding the behavior and intentions of other nationstended to be more pessimistic than those from Democrat leaders, producinga partisan divide at the mass level.

What, then, might we expect in the pre-September 11, 2001 era? Duringthe first few years of the 1990s the most visible Republic elite was undoubt-edly President George H.W. Bush, who, one could argue, signaled that theUnited States could place at least a moderate degree of trust in many nations

(e.g., the members of the coalition that he assembled to oppose Iraq).

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In1992, however, he was defeated in his bid for reelection. Afterward themessages from his party appeared to shift toward greater pessimism regardingother nationsa trend that culminated in the 2000 presidential nomination ofhis son, George W. Bush, who seemed to signal considerably greater skepti-cism about other nations than his father had. Meanwhile, Democratic lead-ersmost notably President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Goresentsignals regarding other nations that appeared to be relatively optimistic aboutthe prospects of obtaining honesty and fair play from other nations. As Holsti

(2004, pp. 241248) observes:During the electoral campaign, members of the Bush team asserted that they wouldpresent a dramatically different orientation toward world affairs than that of theoutgoing Clinton administration. The Bush administrations goals, strategies, andtactics would be characterized by a hardheaded realism. . .

Assuming (for now) that citizens received this set of signals, one can derivetwo hypotheses. The first is that Republicans, relative to Democrats, shouldhave placed less trust in other nations during the 1990s. The second is that thepartisan gap in such trust should have widened over the course of the 1990s asthe signals from Republican elites became increasingly pessimistic in com-parison to Democratic signals.

I add another factor to the list of potential influences on trust in othernations: education. Brewer and his et al. (2004) say little about educationother then to mention that they included it a control in their analysis andfound a positive but non-significant relationship between education and trustin other nations. They neglect the possibility that education conditions theimpact of other factorsparticularly changes in the international environmentand partisan signalson such trust. As numerous studies have shown, moreeducated citizens differ from their less educated peers in that they are morepolitically attentive and knowledgeable in general (e.g. Delli Carpini and



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Keeter, 1996) and more engaged in international affairs in particular (Baum,2003). Thus, one might expect responsiveness to changes in the internationalenvironment to be greater among more educated citizens than among lesseducated citizens. In the context at hand, I expected a greater propensity

among the more educated to update their beliefs about other nations towardgreater trust over the course of the 1990s.In addition, I expected a wider partisan gap among the more educated on

the question of whether to place trust in other nations. This prediction followsfrom Zallers (1992) notion of polarization effects. He posits that people tendto resist arguments that are inconsistent with their political predispositions,but they do so only to the extent that they possess the contextual informationnecessary to perceive a relationship between the message and their predis-positions (p. 44). In other words, increased awareness translates into an

increased propensity to reject signals from opposing partisan elites but not anincreased propensity to reject signals from elites on ones own side of thepolitical fence. Thus, when political elites diverge along partisan lines, theirpolarization should be reflected more strongly in the opinions of the politicallyaware than in the opinions of the relatively unaware (Zaller, 1992, pp. 100101). In the context at hand, I argue that partisan elites diverged on the extentto which the United States should trust other nations; accordingly, I expectededucation to condition the impact of partisanship on such trust.

THE CONSEQUENCES OF TRUST IN OTHER NATIONS

Previous research has yielded intriguing but seemingly paradoxical con-clusions about the impact of trust in other nations on public opinion aboutforeign policy, especially in regards to support for internationalism and its twofaces, cooperative internationalism and militant internationalism (seeChanley, 1999; Holsti, 2004; Wittkopf, 1990). Looking at post-September 11,2001 opinion, Brewer et al. (2004) found that such trust fostered generalpreferences for international involvement over isolationism, as well as support

for cooperative forms of internationalism such as humanitarian aid. Thesefindings fit with the notion that citizens use their generalized beliefs aboutother nations as shortcuts for making sense of world affairs: as the authorsexplain, higher levels of trust in other nations should lead to more optimisticconclusions about the prospects for successful interventions in general andsuccessful cooperative efforts in particular. In broader terms the resultssupport the premise that citizens, in thinking about world affairs, tend toengage in heuristic processing, reasoning from abstract beliefs to particularopinions (see Hurwtiz and Peffley, 1987). More puzzling is Brewer et al.s(2004) finding that although trust in other nations had no discernible effect onsupport for militant internationalism (i.e., using military force to solve inter-national problems) as a general principle it did shape opinion toward a specific

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military intervention: higher levels of trust in other nations translated into lesssupport for military action to prevent Iraq from obtaining weapons of massdestruction.

With these points in mind, I consider the potential effects of trust in other

nations on some additional dimensions of public opinion about world affairs.One such dimension is whether citizens see diplomacy (a primary tool ofcooperative internationalism) or military strength (the essential tool of militantinternationalism) as the best route to ensuring peace. Preferences regardingthese approaches may be theoretically and empirically distinct from oneanother in principle (see Chanley, 1999; Wittkopf, 1990); in practice, however,the public is sometimes presented with choices between diplomatic andmilitant approaches. The recent dilemma regarding United States policytoward Saddam Husseins regime in Iraq is one obvious instance of this. I

hypothesize that trust in other nations will foster preferences for diplomacyover military strength: the more one believes that other countries engage infair play, the more one should see diplomacy as an effective tool. At the sametime, I recognize that other predispositions may also shape preferences fordiplomacy. For example, diverging partisan signals regarding the relativemerits of diplomacy and military strength could produce partisan differencesin public opinion toward these approaches (see, e.g., Holsti, 2004). Likewise,positive beliefs about government may foster preferences for diplomaticengagement between governments.

I also attempt to provide a clearer picture of how trust in other nationsshapes support for specific military interventions. My starting point is theargument that public opinion responds in different ways to different sorts ofinterventions. Specifically, Jentleson (1992; see also Jentleson and Britton,1998) has posited that aggregate-level public support for uses of force varies

with the principle policy objective of the intervention. His original theorydistinguished between two such objectives: foreign policy restraint (i.e.,responding to aggression by an adversary) and internal political change(Jentleson, 1992); a later version added a third, humanitarian intervention

(Jentleson and Britton, 1998). Building on his approach, I argue that thenature of the individual-level relationship between public trust in othernations and public support for use of force may also vary with interventiontype.

With this in mind, I consider the potential effects of trust in othernationsas well as partisanship, beliefs about government, and preferencesfor diplomacyon support for military intervention in response to two keyproblems in United States foreign policy during the 1990s. One of theseproblems was fundamentally a security dilemma: should the United States useforce, if necessary, to prevent North Korea from obtaining nuclear weapons?Although President Clinton ultimately followed a diplomatic path in dealingwith North Korea the public debate over the issue included discussion of



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military solutions. As Jentleson and Britton (1998) note, this scenario falls intothe category of foreign policy restraint (as might the Iraq war in its formulationas an effort to prevent a potential aggressor from obtaining weapons of massdestruction). It seems plausible that low levels of trust in other nations would

foster support for intervention in such a case: the less one trusts other nations,the more necessary foreign policy restraint should seem.The second problem revolved more around humanitarian or nation-

building concerns than immediate security concerns: should the UnitedStates commit troops to peacekeeping efforts in Bosnia and Kosovo? Here,Clinton decided to deploy troops. Jentleson and Britton (1998) characterizethe Bosnia case as having a mix of principle policy objectives; this particu-larly dimension of the intervention, however, seems to fit either thehumanitarian intervention or internal political change category (or both)

better than the foreign policy restraint category. The same is true of theKosovo case. In such cases, it seems likely that trust in other nations wouldbe positively related to support for the intervention: compared to their morecynical peers, those who trust other nations should have higher hopes for thesuccess of humanitarian and nation-building efforts and fewer fears abouthow other nations involved such endeavors might take advantage of Amer-ican help.

DATA AND MEASURES

The first task in studying generalized trust in other nation during the pre-September 2001 era is finding measures of it. Brewer et al.s (2004) studyrelied on two items to measure this sort of trust in the post-September 11,2001 era: Generally speaking, would you say that the United States can trustother nations or that the United States cant be too careful in dealing withother nations? and Would you say that most of the time other nations try tobe helpful to the United States or that they are just looking out for them-selves? Subsequent research has demonstrated through confirmatory factor

analysis that these two items capture a construct that is distinct from (althoughrelated to) both generalized trust in people and generalized beliefs aboutgovernment (Brewer et al., 2005).

No prior study asked these exact questions; two surveys conducted by thePew Research Center for the People and the Press did, however, ask aquestion that might as a reasonable alternative measure of generalized trust inother nations. For each of these surveys, respondents were selected throughrandom digit dialing and interviewed by telephone. The first survey wasconducted July 1227, 1994 and had a sample size of 3,800; the second wasconducted July 14September 9, 1999, and had a sample size of 3,973. Fur-ther details about the methodology of each survey are available from the PewResearch Center Measures were as follows:

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Trust in Other Nations

Respondents in each survey were presented with two statementsOthercountries generally treat the United States about as fairly as we treat them andOther countries often take unfairadvantage of the United Statesand instructed

to indicate which statement came closer to their views. A follow-up question askedwhether respondents agreed strongly or not strongly with the statement theyhad chosen. I coded responses so that strongly endorsing the first statement 1,endorsing the first statement not strongly 2/3, endorsing the secondstatement not strongly 1/3, and endorsing the second statement strongly 0.

Of course, this survey question does not explicitly mention trust. Thus, onemight reasonably question whether it truly captures the construct of interest.Evidence from a 2004 survey of 543 North Carolina adults (chosen throughprobability sampling), however, suggests that it does. This survey included the

two items used by Brewer et al. (2004), as well as one item closely resemblingthe Pew measure: Do you think that other nations generally treat the UnitedStates fairly, or that they often take unfair advantage of the United States?Responses to the latter item were strongly correlated with responses to theformer items; moreover, responses to all three items had similar distributionsand were related in similar (and theoretically expected) ways to age, parti-sanship, and support for the war in Iraq (see Brewer and Vercellotti, 2004).

The distributions for the Pew item suggest that cynicism about other nationswas more common than trust in other nations during the 1990s, just as was the

case in the post-September 11, 2001 era. In 1994, 79% of the respondentsbelieved that other countries often take unfair advantage of the United States,

with 68% endorsing this notion strongly. Only 21% of the 1994 respondentsbelieved that other countries generally treat the United States fairly, with 11%endorsing this notion strongly. Five years later the picture was mostly thesame: 73% endorsed the cynical perspective (with 61% strongly endorsing it),

whereas only 27% endorsed the trusting perspective (with 14% stronglyendorsing it). Note, however, that trust in other nations increased over thisperiod: the mean level of such trust rose from .21 (standard deviation .35)

in 1994 to .27 (standard deviation .38) in 1999, a difference in means thatwas statistically significant at the .01 level. Of course, my use of a differentmeasure than the one Brewer et al. (2004) used precludes direct comparisonsbetween the levels of trust in other nations before and after September 11,2001; all that I can say is that such trust appears to have been the exception,rather than the rule, during both periods.2

Preferences for Diplomacy as the Best Way to Ensure Peace

Respondents in each survey also chose between the following pair of state-ments: Good diplomacy is the best way to ensure peace and The best way to



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ensure peace is through military strength. As before, I coded responses so thatstrongly endorsing, the first statement 1, endorsing the first statement notstrongly 2/3, endorsing the second statement not strongly 1/3, andendorsing the second statement strongly 0. Note that this measure captures

opinion about an explicit tradeoff between two approaches in internationalaffairs: a militant one and a peaceful, cooperative one. Among respondents in the1994 survey, 62% endorsed diplomacy as the best way to ensure peace and 49%did so strongly. Of the 38% who endorsed military strength instead, 29% did sostrongly. The distribution for 1999 respondents was virtually identical; indeed,the 1999 mean and standard deviation for this variable were the same as its 1994mean and standard deviation (mean .61 and standard deviation .44 forboth).

Support for Specific Interventions

Half of the respondents in the 1994 survey (n 1,899) were randomlyselected to be asked whether they strongly favored (coded as 1), favored (codedas 2/3), opposed (coded as 1/3), or strongly opposed (coded as 0) usingAmerican military force, if necessary, to make sure North Korea does not obtainnuclear weapons. Similarly, half of the respondents in the 1999 survey (n 1,974) were randomly selected to be asked whether they strongly favored (codedas 1), favored (coded as 2/3), opposed (coded as 1/3), or strongly opposed (coded

as 0) using American military troops as peacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo.Support for the North Korea intervention was substantially greater than supportfor the Bosnia and Kosovo interventions.3 In the former case, 74% favored theintervention (35% did so strongly) whereas only 27% opposed it (8% did sostrongly). In the latter case, 55% supported intervention (14% did so strongly),compared to 45% who did not (including 18% strongly opposed). The mean forthe North Korea measure was .67 (standard deviation .31); for the Bosnia andKosovo measure it was .51 (standard deviation .52).

Party Identification

Both surveys included the traditional branching-format measure of partyidentification, which I used to construct a seven-category measure trans-formed to range from strong Democrat (coded as 0) to strong Republican(coded as 1). The mean for party identification was .49 in 1994 and .48 in 1999(with standard deviations of .34 and .33, respectively).

Beliefs About Government

Both surveys included two measures of beliefs about government, each ofwhich could be labeled more specifically a measure of external political efficacy

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(which is related to, but distinct from, political trust; see, e.g., Craig, Niemi, andSilver, 1990). Each followed the same format as the measures of trust in othernations and preferences for diplomacy (i.e., a forced choice between twostatements followed by a measure of opinion strength). The first item asked

respondents to choose whether Elected officials in Washington lose touch withthe people pretty quickly or Elected officials in Washington try hard to stay intouch with voters back home. The second asked whether Most elected officialscare about what people like me think or Most elected officials dont care about

what people like me think. I combined responses to the two items into an indexof external political efficacy that ranged from 0 to 1, where 1 indicated maximumexternal efficacy. In 1994 the mean for this Index was .30 (standard deviation .31); in 1999 it was .33 (standard deviation .32).4

Demographic Variables

The surveys also provided measures for a set of potentially relevantdemographic variables. My measure of age was in years/100.5 Education wasmeasured on a seven-category scale transformed to range from 0 to 1, andincome was measured on an eight-category scaled transformed in a similarmanner. Dichotomous variables captured whether respondents were female(coded as 1) or male and whether they self-identified as African American,Hispanic, and Asian (all coded in similar fashion).6

EXPLAINING TRUST IN OTHER NATIONS

My first set of analyses examined the predictors of trust in other nationsduring the pre-September 11, 2001 (but post-Cold War) era. For theseanalyses I pooled the 1994 and 1999 samples. Model 1 included two funda-mental political predispositionsparty identification and external politicalefficacyand the demographic measures as independent variables. The firstcolumn of Table 1 presents the results.7 As expected, party identification and

external political efficacy both had statistically significant coefficients:Republicans expressed less trust in other nations than did Democrats, andrespondents with high levels of external efficacy expressed greater trust inother nations than did those who were more cynical about government. Theformer relationship is consistent with an account in which citizens use signalsfrom partisan elites to derive their generalized beliefs about othernationsassuming, again, that during this period Republican elites tendedmore than Democratic elites to signal that other nations would take advantageof the United States. The latter relationship is consistent with a comple-mentary account in which citizens derive their generalized beliefs about othernations from beliefs about their own government. Both patterns also parallelfindings from the post-September 11 2001 era (see Brewer et al. 2004). The



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magnitudes of these coefficients were not particularly striking in the presentanalysis, particularly in the case of party identification; as I will show, however,the relationship between party identification and trust in other nations wasmore pronounced under certain conditions.

Three demographic factors were related to trust in other nation: age,education, and self-identification as Asian. Consistent with expectations, as

TABLE 1. Predicting Trust in Other Nations

Model 1 Model 2 Model 3

Party Identification .07** .04 .09**(.01) (.02) (.03)

Party Identification Year 1999 .07** .06*(.03) (.03)

Party Identification Education .22*(.03)

External Political Efficacy .12** .14** .11**(.01) (.02) (.04)

External Political Efficacy Year 1999 .04 .05(.03) (.03)

External Political Efficacy Education .06(.05)

Female

.004

.01

.01(.01) (.01) (.01)Age .27** .20** .20**

(.03) (.04) (.04)Age Year 1999 .14* .14*

(.06) (.06)Education .26** .21** .30**

(.02) (.02) (.04)Education Year 1999 .09** .09**

(.03) (.03)Income .02 .03 .04*

(.02) (.02) (.02)African American .004 .01 .01(.02) (.02) (.02)

Hispanic .01 .01 .01(.02) (.02) (.02)

Asian .13** .12** .12**(.04) (.04) (.04)

Year 1999 .10** .10**(.04) (.04)

Constant .21 .17 .12(.02) (.03) (.03)

R2

.07 .08 .08N 6233 6233 6233

Note: Table entries are OLS regression coefficients; standard errors are in parentheses.*p < .05; ** p < .01.

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well as previous research on the post-September 11, 2001 era, youngerrespondents expressed significantly greater trust in other nations than didolder ones. This finding fits a socialization-based account: if peoples beliefsabout other nations are fixed in part by the nature of the international envi-

ronment into which they come of age, then one would expect Americans whocame of age during the relatively hostile international environments of WorldWar II and the height of the Cold War to express less trust in other nationsthan those who came of age during the waning years of the Cold War orthe post-Cold War (but pre-September 11, 2001) era.8 A contrast emergedbetween more and less educated respondents, as well, with the formerexpressing greater trust in other nations than did the latter. Such a relationshipcould reflect greater responsiveness on the part of more educated citizens toan increasingly benign post-Cold War international environment.9 In addition,

the relatively few respondents who self-identified as Asian were significantlymore likely than others to express trust in other nations.10

A second model included all of independent variables from Model 2 as wellas a set of variables designed to capture variation from 1994 to 1999 in therelationships between key independent variables and trust in other nations (seeTable 1, column 2). These new variables included a dichotomous variable for

year (coded as 1 for responses from 1999 and 0 for responses from 1994), partyidentification year, external political efficacy year, age year, andeducation year.11 The significant and positive coefficient for the year vari-

able itself indicates a trend toward greater trust in other nations from 1994 to1999, even taking into account the effects of all of the other independentvariables in the model. One logical explanation for this residual trend is thechanging nature of the international environment itself: if this environment wasindeed atypically benign for the United States between 1994 and 1999, thenone might expect citizens to have updated their generalized beliefs accordingly.

The coefficient for external political efficacy did not vary significantly from1994 to 1999. In contrast, the negatively signed and statistically significant (butmodest) coefficient for party identification year indicates that the inverse

relationship between Republican partisanship and trust in other nations grewstronger between 1994 and 1999. Such a trend, in turn, could be explained bya growing contrast over the same period between the signals from Republicanelites and those from Democratic elites about how much trust to place in othernations.

Turning to the other new terms, the negatively signed and significantcoefficient for age year suggests a widening age gap: although olderrespondents were less likely than younger ones to express trust in othernations in 1994, the negative relationship between age and such trust wasdiscernibly stronger in 1999. Cast in terms of a socialization-based explana-tion, this finding could reflect a greater tendency among younger citizens thanamong older ones to respond to changes in the international environment The



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education gapthat is, the tendency of more educated respondents to expressgreater trust in other nationswidened between the dates of the two surveysas well, judging by the positive and significant interaction between educationand year. This trend could likewise be explained in terms of a particularly

strong propensity among the educated to respond to an unusually benigninternational environment.A third model provided a closer look at the role of education in shaping trust

in other nations. In addition to the independent variables included in Model 2,Model 3 included two multiplicative terms designed to capture whether therelationships between political predispositions and trust in other nationsdepended on the respondents education level: party identification educa-tion and external political efficacy education. I included the latter termbecause scholars have raised the possibility that the extent to which citizens

use information shortcuts and reason from general beliefs may vary withpolitical sophistication [although the evidence here is mixed; see Lau andRedlawsk (2001) and Goren (2004) for overviews]. As the third column ofTable 1 reports, the party identification education term had a negative andstatistically significant coefficient. Thus, the relationship between party iden-tification and trust in other nations was contingent on education: the partisangap in such trust widened with education. This finding provides furthersupport for an account in which partisans among the public respond topolarized signals from partisan elites about whether to place trust in other

nations, given that exposure to such signals should be greater among moreeducated (and thus more politically attentive) citizens than among less edu-cated ones. On the other hand, the coefficient for external political efficacy education fell short of statistical significance; thus, I failed to find evidencethat the relationship between beliefs about government and trust in othernations varied across education levels. An additional analysis that includedparty identification education year and external political efficacy education year terms (neither of which attained statistical significance)suggested that the role of education in conditioning the effects of partisanship

and beliefs about government did not vary discernibly over time.

EXPLAINING PREFERENCES FOR DIPLOMACY AND SUPPORT FORINTERVENTIONS

The next analysis examined how trust in other nations and a variety of otherfactors were related to preferences for diplomacy rather than military strengthas the best way to ensure peace. Again, the choice between these approachesis often a key point in public debate over the course of United States foreignpolicy. My model for preferences between them included trust in othernations, party identification, external political efficacy, and the previouslydescribed set of demographics (see Table 2 first column)

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TABLE 2. Predicting Preferences for Diplomacy as the Best Way to EnsurePeace

Model 1 Model 2Trust in Other Nations .05** .08*

(.02) (.04)Trust in Other Nations Education .15**

(.06)Trust in Other Nations Year 1999 .07*

(.03)Party Identification .22** .03

(.02) (.04)Party Identification Education .31**

(.06)Party Identification Year 1999 .004(.03)

External Political Efficacy .05** .07(.02) (.04)

External Political Efficacy Education .003(.07)

External Political Efficacy Year 1999 .05(.04)

Female .16** .16**(.01) (.01)

Age

.45**

.42**

(.04) (.05)Age Year 1999 .07

(.07)Education .02 .14**

(.02) (.05)Education Year 1999 .03

(.04)Income .10** .11**

(.02) (.02)African American .003 .01

(.02) (.02)Hispanic .05* .05*

(.02) (.02)Asian .13** .13**

(.04) (.04)Year 1999 .04

(.04)Constant .83 .74

(.03) (.04)R2 .11 .12N 5811 5811




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Of the three predispositions in the model, party identification had the mostsizable coefficient, with Republicans being less likely than Democrats toprefer diplomacy (a finding that fits with previous research; see Holsti, 2004,p. 179). If Republican elites tended more than Democratic ones to signal

preferences for military strength over diplomacy, then this finding wouldfollow from a signaling account. At the same time, the results are also con-sistent with an account in which people derive their preferences between thediplomatic and militant approaches from generalized beliefs about othernations and their own government: higher levels of trust in other nationspredicted stronger preferences for diplomacy, as did higher levels of externalefficacy. As for the demographic variables, four mattered: sex, age, income,and self-identification as Asian.

I also estimated a model that included the previously described year vari-

able as well as trust in other nations

year, trust in other nations

education,party identification year, party identification education, external politicalefficacy year, external political efficacy education, age year, and edu-cation year (see Table 2, column 2). Here, I found that the relationshipbetween trust in other nations and preferences for diplomacy was stronger in1999 than it had been in 1994. Such a shift could be explained by an increasingpropensity on the part of citizens to rely on their beliefs about other nations informing foreign policy principles for a post-Cold War world. In other respects,the structure of preferences for diplomacy appeared to be consistent from

1994 to 1999, with one exception: the relationship between external politicalefficacy and preferences for diplomacy was weaker in 1999 than it had been in1994. Interestingly, the coefficient for trust in other nations was also largeramong the most educated respondents than among less educated respondents.The party identification education term had a negative and statisticallysignificant coefficient (providing additional evidence for a signaling-basedaccount), whereas the coefficient for external political efficacy education fellshort of significance.

The final pair of analyses examined how trust in other nations and other key

variables were related to support for two different sorts of interventions.Although both involved the use of the United States military, one revolvedaround using military force to address a potential threat to national security (toprevent North Korea from obtaining nuclear weapons, 1994) whereas theother revolved around using military troops to address humanitarian andnation-building concerns (peacekeeping in Bosnia and Kosovo, 1999). I esti-mated the same model for each invention. In addition to trust in other nations,the model included preferences for diplomacy, party identification, externalpolitical efficacy, and the previously discussed demographic variables.

As Table 3 shows, the structure of support for one intervention differed inseveral ways from the structure of support for the other (although the rela-tively low proportion of variance explained in each case may warrant caution in

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interpreting the results). Perhaps the most dramatic contrast lies in thecoefficients for trust in other nations: whereas trust in other nations had a

negative and significant (if modest) coefficient in the case of using of force toprevent North Korea from obtaining nuclear weapons, it had a positive andsignificant (if equally modest) coefficient in the case of using troops aspeacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo. Thus, the results not only corroborateBrewer et al.s (2004) earlier finding that trust in other nations is related tosupport for military interventions; they also indicate that the sign of therelationship can vary from one intervention to another. Moreover, the results,

when combined with previous findings, suggest that the nature of the inter-vention may dictate the sign of the relationship. Specifically, the pattern offindings implies that cynicism about other nations predicts support for pri-marily securitymotivated interventions (e.g., North Korea; Iraq in Brewer

TABLE 3. Predicting Support for Specific Interventions

Using force to make sureNorth Korea doesnt obtainnuclear weapons (1994)

Using troops aspeacekeepers in Bosniaand Kosovo (1999)

Trust in Other Nations .07** .07**(.02) (.02)

Preferences for Diplomacy .08** .02(.02) (.02)

Party Identification .03 .16**(.03) (.03)

External Political Efficacy .003 .12**(.03) (.03)

Female .01 .02(.02) (.02)

Age

.15**

.01(.05) (.06)Education .12** .06

(.03) (.04)Income .06 .05

(.03) (03)African American .03 .08**

(.02) (.03)Hispanic .02 .02

(.03) (.03)Asian .09 .04

(.07) (.05)Constant .85 .54(.04) (.04)

R2 .04 .05N 1490 1366




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et al.s 2004 study), whereas trust in other nations predicts support forinterventions primarily motivated by humanitarian and nation-building goals(e.g., Bosnia and Kosovo). In the cases at hand these relationships would, inturn, predict higher aggregate levels of support for the North Korea inter-

vention and lower aggregate levels of support for the Bosnia and Kosovointerventions, given the low level of trust in other nations; thus, widespreadcynicism about other nations may help to explain why support for the former

was greater than support for the latter.The structure of support for the North Korean intervention differed form

the structure of support toward the Bosnia and Kosovo interventions in otherways, as well. To begin with, preferences for diplomacy were negativelyrelated to support for the North Korean intervention but not significantlyrelated to support for Bosnia and Kosovo interventions. One plausible

explanation for the apparent contrast is that the former involved a clear choicebetween diplomacy and military action, whereas the latter could be seen ascombining the two approaches. Another contrast revolved around partyidentification: Whereas Republicans and Democrats did not differ discerniblyin support for the North Korea intervention, Republicans were less likely thanDemocrats to favor the Bosnia and Kosovo interventions (see Holsti, 2004 forsimilar results on the latter point).12 Here, the likely explanation for thecontrast is that the former intervention was merely hypothetical and not thesubject of substantial partisan debate whereas the latter was clearly tied to

the current Democratic administration and inter-party debates. Yet anothercontrast revolved around external political efficacy, which had no discerniblerelationship with support for the North Korean intervention but a positiverelationship with support for the Bosnia and Kosovo interventions. It may bethat interventions with largely humanitarian and nation-building goals aremore likely than security-motivated interventions to be seen by citizens asproviding benefits to others and costs to themselves; thus, humanitarian andnation-building interventions may implicate beliefs about government to agreater degree (see Hetherington and Globetti, 2002).13

CONCLUSION

This studys most basic finding is that low levels of trust in other nationsamong the American public are evidently more than just a post-September 11,2001 phenomenon. Indeed, public perceptions of the international realm as adog-eat-dog world date back to the quieter era that preceded the terroristattacks. Another finding is that the fundamental structure of trust in othernations appears to have been constant over time: such trust was related to age,partisanship, and beliefs about government in similar ways during both thepre- and post-September 11, 2001 eras. At the same time, the findings alsoprovide new insights regarding changes over time in the level and structure of

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trust in other nations. Trust in other nations increased as the Cold Warreceded into history; moreover, the ways in which age, education, and parti-sanship were related to this form of trust varied from 1994 to 1999. All of theseshifts matched expectations derived from a theoretical account in which the

nature of the international environment and partisan signals about it maychange over time.My findings clarify the consequences of trust in other nation, as well. I

found that trust in other nations was related to preferences between diplo-matic and militant approaches to international politics during the pre-Sep-tember 11, 2001; likewise, it was related to support for specific militaryinterventions. The strength of its relationship with preferences for diplomacyover military strength increased over time, however. In addition, the nature ofthe relationship between trust in other nations and support for interventions

depended on the nature of the intervention in questiona result that not onlysolves a riddle posed by Brewer et al.s (2004) results but also follows fromprevious arguments about the publics capacity to draw distinctions betweendifferent sorts of interventions (Jentleson, 1992; Jentelson and Britton, 1998).

To be certain, some caution is warranted in drawing these conclusions. Mostobviously, perhaps, the measure of trust in other nations used here is not onlydifferent from the one used in previous research; it is also based on a singlesurvey item. On the other hand, evidence suggests that it can serve as a validmeasure of the construct. Another caveat is that the tests of my hypotheses

were limited to correlational analysis of cross-sectional data, necessitating carein drawing conclusions about cause and effect. Then again, all of my findingsare at least consistent with my causal account. Furthermore, previous researchbolsters my argument that people reason from fundamental beliefs such asparty loyalties and beliefs about government to generalized beliefs about othernations, from generalized beliefs about other nationsas well as party loyal-ties and beliefs about governmentto foreign policy principles, and from allof these abstract beliefs to more specific foreign policy opinions, rather than inthe opposite directions (Brewer et al., 2004; Peffley and Hurwitz, 1993). A

final point bearing mention is that the results do not extend as far back as theCold War (or pre-1991) era, preventing direct analysis within this period orcomparisons of it to the following one.

Considered within the bounds these caveats, the results may speak to con-cerns about the rationality of public opinion in general and of generalizedbeliefs about other nations in particular. Brewer et al. (2004, p. 107) suggestthat widespread cynicism about other nations among the public may contributeto (or even constitute) a distorted perspective on world affairs; in particular,they suggest that low levels of trust in other nations may lead citizens to formunrealistically cynical views on foreign policy issues. Although the resultspresented in here do not directly address this argument, they do imply that thepublics beliefs about other nations change in predictable and understandable



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ways. Thus, these beliefs meet two of the key criteria that Page and Shapiroidentify for rationality in public opinion about world affairs (Page and Shapiro,1992, p. xi). Put another way, shifts in ordinary citizens generalized beliefsabout other nations are not without rhyme and reason.

At the same time, the results raise the question of why so few Americansplace trust in other nations, not just during periods of crisis and obviousdanger but also during periods of relative security. Although factors such asthe nature of the international environment, partisan signals, and beliefs aboutgovernment may influence trust in other nations at the margins, widespreadcynicism about other nations could well be an enduring fixture of the Amer-ican political landscape. Why, then, might this be the case? One way of lookingfor an answer might be to consider the publics distrust of other nations as areasonableeven rationalstrategy for dealing with an international arena

dominated by a war of all against all between self-interested nations andgoverned by no Leviathan save, perhaps, the United States itself [seeHobbes, 1985 (1660)]. Put another way, a majority of Americans may look at

world affairs as folk realists (see Morganthau, 1978).14 An alternative, orperhaps complementary approach, would be to consider the cultural foun-dations of public cynicism about other nations. Such cynicism may have deeproots in American political thought, extending from contemporary foreignpolicy rhetoric to historical discourse about foreign policy (e.g., George

Washingtons farewell address; see Brewer et al., 2004), to Hobbes, Thucyd-

ides, and some the other cornerstones of Western political thought. Thenagain, low levels of public trust in other nations could also be rooted inethnocentrism (see, e.g., Duckitt, 1989; Hurwtiz and Peffly, 1987) or per-sonality dynamics (see, e.g., McCloskey 1967; Sniderman and Citrin, 1971).Future research might examine each of these possibilities, not only in thecontext of the United States but also in comparative perspective.

Acknowledgments. The author thanks the Pew Research Center for thePeople and the Press for access to its data and Michael Dimock for his

assistance in providing this access. The author also thanks the anonymousreviewers for their helpful comments.

NOTES

1. To be sure, he also signaled that there were exceptions (most notably, Iraq).2. Likewise, comparing the distributions from the national samples in the Pew surveys to the

distribution from the North Carolina sample in the 2004 survey would be problematic.3. Note, however, that support for each varied across time and question wording (see, e.g.,

Jentleson and Beitton, 1998). Interestingly, the North Korea intervention might have involvedconsiderably greater casualties than the Bosnia and Kosovo interventions; see Feaver andGelpi (2004) for further discussion of casualties and support for uses of force.

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4. The correlation between responses to the two items was a relatively modest .31, but eachmeasure produced similar effects when considered separately in the following analyses.

5. Note that my theoretical account discusses the effect of age in terms of generational cohorts asopposed to a linear variable. With this in mind, I also conducted an analysis in which I dividedrespondents into three age cohorts: a cohort whose members turned 25 in 1970 or before (i.e.,

before detente; 31% of respondents, including 4% who turned 25 in 1945 or before), onewhose members turned 25 in 1991 or before (i.e., during the late Cold War; 46%), and onewhose members turned 25 after 1991 (i.e., after the end of the Cold War; 21%). When Ireplaced the linear age variable with two dichotomous variables for membership in the oldestand youngest cohorts (treating the middle cohort as the baseline), I found significant coeffi-cients for both (p < .01 for each). As expected, the oldest cohort placed the least trust in othernations, and the youngest placed the most. Given that the relationship between cohort andtrust in other nations was monotonic, I simply treated age as a linear variable in the analysespresented in the text.

6. Details about the demographic composition of the samples are available from the author orthe Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.

7. I used both ordinary least squares regression and ordered probit to estimate the coefficientsfor the models presented below. Given that my substantive findings did not differ acrossmethod of estimation, I present the OLS results for the sake of simplicity

8. Again, see footnote 5 for a more formal test of this generational hypothesis.9. An alternative account might point toward the content of formal education; such an account,

however, provides no obvious explanation for why the relationship between education andtrust in other nations changed over time (see below).

10. Such a relationship might reflect differences between Asian-Americans and non-Asian-Americans in experiences or information-holding. One should be cautious in interpreting thiscoefficient, however, given that the sample included only 123 Asian-American respondents.

11. Additional analyses indicated that the effects of the other independent variables did not vary

significantly from 1994 to 1999.12. At the same time, the bivariate correlation between partisanship and support for the North

Korea intervention was positive and approached statistical significance (.04, p .11), sug-gesting that partisanship may have been indirectly related (through trust in other nations andpreferences for diplomacy) to support in this case.

13. In addition, age and education were significantly related to support for the North Koreaintervention but not to support for the Bosnia and Kosovo interventions, and self-identifica-tion as African-American was significantly related to the latter but not the former. Theabsence of an obvious gender gap may seem surprising at first glance. The bivariate cor-relation between being female and supporting the North Korea intervention was negative andstatistically significant, however (.05, p < .05), suggesting that gender may have had indirect

effects (e.g., through preferences for diplomacy). The bivariate correlation between genderand supporting the Bosnia and Kosovo interventions fell short of statistical significance; thenagain, recall that preferences between diplomacy and military strength were not related tosupport for this intervention, either.

14. One might consider this ironic, given realisms traditional view of public opinion.

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