A network-based study of ideological conflict in public policy and global governance

Abstract

Humanity's ability to deal with its vast array of challenges depends on its capacity to understand how ideologies and worldviews inform and interact with decision-making processes. Once relegated to dusty library shelves, and declared “dead” at least twice, ideology seems to be more relevant to global politics then ever. Ideology plays a crucial role in how societies understand, frame, and attempt to solve collective problems; but when viewed as just a unidimensional phenomenon comprised of a few “big isms,” much of ideology’s causal influence/impact gets obscured. Further, existing scholarship tends to study ideology as primarily an individual-level or society-level phenomenon, setting aside questions about social context in the first instance and questions about the inner workings of the mind in the second instance. This paper-based dissertation contributes to the existing scholarship on ideology by (1) synthesizing over a decade’s worth of efforts to map the multidisciplinary field of ideology studies, and (2) by developing a novel framework—grounded in a complexity ontology—to analyze the interconnections between ideologies, discourses, and social networks. Together, the three articles in this dissertation deepen our understanding of how ideologies shape and are shaped by the social and discourse networks in which they are embedded. By studying the role of these interacting elements in multiple governance contexts, the dissertation further shows how and why ideology matters across policymaking scales and spheres of influence. The main goal of Article #1 is to provide a comprehensive look at the many different ways that ideology is conceptualized, understood, and studied. Building on several major mapping efforts, this chapter synthesizes the field of ideology studies using an Ideology Research Matrix comprised of three dimensions: the methodological approaches used, the underlying ontological commitments of scholars, and the typical research goals and designs that accompany those methods and commitments. After engaging systematically with the literature via the Matrix, the paper discusses the problems with current approaches to ideology, especially around the particularly difficult challenge of studying ideological change. The paper calls for a more integrated approach and makes the case for a complex reflexive systems approach to conceptualizing and studying ideology. It fleshes out the details and benefits of a complexity ontology in this context, particularly around linking causation and social context through identifying feedback loops across social and discursive scales. Grounded in this much-needed complex systems shift, this article presents a new conceptual framework of trans-scalar ideological networks—and a proposed methodology that uses networks as both metaphor and modelling tool—that integrates the perspectives of existing ideology scholarship and moves forward our understanding of ideological change. In Article #2, my co-authors and I operationalize the framework developed in Article #1 using a case study of energy transition discourse in Canadian Parliamentary proceedings. Skepticism about Canada's ability to meet its Paris Agreement targets, anxieties over economic and energy security, and major concerns about the impact of an energy transition on key vulnerable or marginalized communities have all led to a wide range of ideologically charged priorities for addressing the climate crisis and distributing the costs/benefits of energy transition. This chapter presents the first operationalization of the trans-scalar ideological networks framework, focusing on the energy transition discourse. The article first examines existing literature related to ideology and climate change, identifying gaps where it can contribute. It then argues that tracing "how and why ideological discourses have the influence they do" is both more difficult and more important in non-polarized contexts, as ideological conflict and influence are still at play in more subtle ways that are not well-captured by existing methods. As the ideological differences between groups advancing different goals, priorities, and policies become less pronounced (e.g., between climate change "believers" and "deniers"), the task of tracing or measuring "how and why ideological discourses have the influence they do" becomes more nuanced and difficult, but just as important. Using my framework, the chapter demonstrates a multi-directional approach to studying ideology: first outside-in (using Discourse Network Analysis), then inside-out (using Cognitive-Affective Mapping). The chapter identifies several emergent ideological “camps” and dives deeper into “representative actors” from each camp and examines their ideologies from the inside-out, using CAM. Overall, the paper supports my claim that ideological heterogeneity—just as much as ideological polarization—matters for how ideology influences decision-making. Article #3 examines a second case study, civil society advocacy efforts leading to the 2013 Arms Trade Treaty (ATT). The chapter operationalizes the trans-scalar ideological networks framework to study the ATT, making the case that multi-scale approaches are especially useful in studying these complex international advocacy spaces where ideology helps shape governance outcomes. In the more narrative-based section, the chapter describes the post-Cold War background of arms control advocacy, as well as the key actors and events that led to the ATT being proposed and eventually passed. It demonstrates and explores the ideologies of four key organizations using CAM and compares insights across the four CAMs generated. It also maps the broader issue network using social network analysis (the outside-in approach) and analyzes how the CAM insights inform/explain some aspects of the network structure. Compared to Article #2, this article offers another way to operationalize the trans-scalar ideological networks framework, showing that the framework is well-suited to more "established" cases in addition to more "active" ones (like the energy transition discourse case). Finally, the chapter argues that new developments in ideology studies—including my trans-scalar ideological networks framework—can help address many of the challenges that other ideationally-focused sub-disciplines face, especially around the supposed "belief vs. strategy" dichotomy.