Civic engagement in times of economic crisis: a cross-national comparative study of voluntary association membership

Do economic crises mobilize or depress civic engagement? This paper examines this question by analysing cross-national trends in voluntary association membership in the context of the global financial crisis. A mobilization hypothesis suggests that an economic crisis would increase membership in voluntary associations, as these associations provide citizens a channel for interest articulation and aggregation facilitating their response to the crisis. A retreat hypothesis, on the other hand, suggests that an economic crisis would depress voluntary association membership, as people have fewer resources to be involved in these associations at a time of crisis. To test these hypotheses, this paper examines data on voluntary association memberships from the World Values Survey in 14 democratic countries, fielded before and after the global financial crisis hit in 2008. The results support the retreat hypothesis. Following the crisis, there was a decline in voluntary association memberships overall and countries harder hit by the crisis were more likely to experience declines. There was no evidence of mobilization among those more vulnerable to the crisis. Rather, the profile of those engaged in voluntary associations was similar before and after the crisis, skewed towards those better off in society, including those with higher education levels, higher incomes, and in paid employment.

Measuring Diversity in Voluntary Association Membership

The membership diversity of voluntary associations is of central interest in the literature investigating the importance of involvement in voluntary associations for civic life. Due to the limited availability of data concerned with the membership composition of voluntary associations, many researchers have adopted a proxy approach that is based on an aggregation of the characteristics of survey respondents who belong to particular types of associations. However, this proxy approach has not yet been validated to assess whether it actually captures voluntary association membership diversity. We address this gap by comparing the proxy approach with a more direct approach for measuring association diversity by using data from the United States Citizenship, Involvement, Democracy Survey and the Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey. Our analyses reveal that the proxy measures are not correlated with direct measures of voluntary association membership diversity.

Income and Area Effects on Voluntary Association Membership in Canada

Applying multi-level modelling techniques to 2003 Canadian General Social Survey and 2001 Census Profile data , this study investigates the influence of individual income, contextual poverty and income inequality on voluntary association membership in Canada. Both individual and contextual effects on membership are uncovered, in addition to a significant cross-level interaction between individual income and area level income inequality. As individual income increases so do the odds of voluntary association membership, an effect that is fairly consistent between areas. Increases in area level poverty are associated with decreases in the odds of membership. While no main effect is found for area level income inequality, cross-level interactions indicate that the relationship between individual income and membership is moderated by area income inequality. The study findings support claims about the negative social effects of individual and contextual economic disadvantage and confirms the importance of examining contextual influences on social outcomes.