Categorization of Global Citizens by Individual Values

1.    Background

In COVID-19 data analysis 4 series, we have observed whether global citizens prefer conservative values or liberal ideas amid COVID-19 pandemic. Also, in data analysis 4.8 we concluded that people who have high requirements on citizens’ requests generally prioritize liberal values, such as civil liberties, economic recovery, rule of law, citizen-centered quarantine, cooperation, and data privacy, which indicates that there is a positive relationship between respect for civil society and different liberal ideas. However, this general trend cannot be applicable for every single individual, for instance, a person could hold liberal and conservative values simultaneously, which means that a citizen can emphasize both on disaster weathering and economic recovery, or stress on civil liberties and social distancing at the same time. Accordingly, we will categorize global citizens by their different individual values and scrutinize how the world is made up of different types of people.

2.    Research Topic

In the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is of importance to balance the public health and private rights, and it is a government duty to make appropriate health policies to satisfy its people. This section will analyze how the international society consists of different types of people according to their individual liberal and conservative beliefs.

3.    Questionnaire Used

Survey Question II-2-1: “It is the duty of a democratic state to protect the lives and health of the public and to ensure the fundamental freedoms of all citizens. In the current situation, what do you think is the most urgent task set before the government of your country?” The answers consist of a 10-point scale, with higher scores indicating an individual who emphasizes more on basic civil rights and lower scores demonstrating a person who underlines overcoming a disaster to protect public health.

Survey Question II-2-2: “In the current situation, what do you think is a more urgent task set before your country between social distancing for public health and returning to normal life for economic recovery?” The answers consist of a 10-point scale, with higher scores indicating an individual who emphasizes more on economic recovery and lower scores demonstrating a person who underlines public health.

4.    Major Outcomes

Table 1: Categorization of Citizens of 28 Global Cities by Liberal and Conservative Values

We used two questions to categorize global citizens into four parts, including “state-centered crisis manager”, “citizens-centered crisis manager”, “economy-centered authoritarian”, and “economy-centered democrat”. State-centered crisis managers constitute the largest portion in global society during the COVID-19 pandemic, making up of 52.1%. This group of people are inclined to be conservative emphasizing both on disaster weathering and social distancing. The second largest group is called economy-centered democrats who are penchant for liberal ideas, stressing on economic recovery and civil liberties, making up of 24.3%.

However, there are still two groups of people who hold contradicting values, such as citizens-centered crisis mangers and economy-centered authoritarians. According to the “COVID-19 data analysis 4.8” people who put an importance on overcoming the disaster highlight social distancing policy; yet, the data analysis shows that some people who highly want to weather the disaster prioritize economic policies than social distancing amid COVID-19, and we call them economy-centered authoritarian, making up of 13.4.%. Likewise, citizens-centered crisis mangers insist on civil liberties, but they underline the policy of social distancing at the same time, making up of 10.2%.

Table 2: Distribution Table of Categorized Individual Values by region

The table indicates the percentage of how many global citizens belong to each type. To illustrate, East Asia has the largest number of “state-centered crisis mangers” who are holding conservative ideology, accounting for 61.8%, followed by South/Southeast Asia, Latin America, North America, Oceania, and Europe. As for liberal “economy-centered democrats” are largely located in Oceania, accounting for 33.4%, followed by Europe, North America, South/Southeast Ais, Latin America, and East Asia. The data demonstrates that East Asia has the largest portion of conservative type of citizens, and the least percentage of liberal type of individuals. Meanwhile, Oceania and Europe have the largest number of liberal citizens and the smallest number of conservative citizens. Besides, “economy-centered authoritarians” are mainly situated in Europe, and “citizens-centered crisis mangers” in Latin America.

Figure 1 is the visualized graph of Table 2, and the blue line, yellow line, orange line, grey line represents state-centered crisis managers, economy-centered democrats, economy-centered authoritarians, and citizens-centered crisis mangers, respectively. There are several conclusions can be drawn by this figure: First, conservative ideology is dominant and prevailing during the pandemic era, as we can see in Figure 1. Second, there is the hugest gap between conservatives and liberals in East Asia, indicating the highest request for overcoming the disaster and people’s social distancing behavior. Third, the smallest gap between conservative and liberal ideas is in Oceania, implying that even though people here highlight overcoming the epidemics, the voice of stressing the civil rights and economy values is also constituted a large portion. Fourth, the global trend is that state-centered crisis managers are made up for the largest parts, followed by economy-centered democrats, then economy-centered authoritarians, and finally citizen-centered crisis managers, but in Latin America, citizens-centered crisis managers are little more than economy-centered authoritarians as an exception.

For analyzing the 28 global cities, we listed how a city composes of different types of people according to their individual values on civil liberties, disaster weathering, economic recovery, and social distancing. Orange cells in the table are the first two cities which accounted for the largest proportion of those categories. To illustrate, Taipei and Manila have the largest proportion of state-centered risk managers in those cities, which composed of 73.5% and 70.5%. Oslo and Berlin have the largest proportion of economy-entered democrats in those cities, which composed of 38.2% and 34.7%. Lisbon and Cape Town, Paris have the largest proportion of economy-centered authoritarians, which composed of 22.2% and 19.6%. Lastly, Santiago and Hong Kong have the largest proportion of citizen-centered crisis managers, which composed of 21.7% and 17.9%.

Figure 2 is the visualized bar graph of table 3, and we can observe more specific data compared to Figure 1. Although the global general trend shows that conservative values are far outweigh liberal ideas during the pandemic era, citizens in Oslo lays more stress on liberal values, shown in Figure 2. Also, there are several cities deviate from the global trend: first, citizens in Osaka, Lisbon, and Manila have larger numbers of economy-centered authoritarians, who want to overcome the crisis but putting accent on economic recovery that social distancing; second, citizens in Hong Kong, New York, Berlin, São Paulo, and Santiago constitute more of citizens-centered crisis managers, who insist on social distancing but put more emphasis on civil liberties than disaster weathering.

5.    Summaries and Further Tasks

a.     Data analysis shows how different types of citizens allocated in their cities.

b.     Globally speaking, conservative values are dominant in international society amid COVID-19 pandemic. This illuminates that global citizens want to overcome the crisis as soon as possible by conducting social distancing.

c.     At the same time, western countries, such as cities in Europe and Oceania, attach greater importance to liberal values than other parts of the world. Although they point out the significance of overcoming the epidemics; however, they also give voice to civil rights and economic values.

d.     There are two groups of people who have conservative and liberal values simultaneously. They are “economy-centered authoritarians” stressing on overcoming the disaster with protecting the economic vitality, along with “citizens-centered crisis managers” underlining the importance of civil liberties and weathering the disaster at the same time.

e.     Unlike other regions, Latin America has a larger number of citizens-centered crisis managers. Also, Hong Kong has this type of citizens more than other parts of the world as well.

f.      The study is limited to descriptive research, and therefore, a more detailed explanative investigation is required to further understand the global citizens’ consciousness presented above. For instance, why some cities deviate from general global trend?