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Category: Project

Description: We provide the first systematic research into the origins of subjective freedom of speech in Germany. Relying on the GLES 2021 Cross-Section Pre-Election Survey which includes a newly designed survey item on subjective freedom of speech, we evaluate a whole range of plausible candidate hypotheses. First, we contribute to cumulative research by testing the explanatory factors in Gibson (1993) – citizens’ social class, their political involvement and political preferences as well as their personality dispositions – for the German case. Second, we will move beyond the state of the art and test three new hypotheses that reflect more recent political developments and arguments in the free speech debate: the role of social media, increasing political and social polarization and the rise of populism. Importantly, all planned analyses and hypothesis tests have been pre-registered prior to data collection.