The sociological theory of postmaterialism was developed in the 1970s by Inglehart. After extensive survey research, Inglehart postulated that the Western societies under the scope of his survey were undergoing transformation of individual values, switching from materialist values, emphasizing economic and physical security, to a new set of postmaterialist values, which instead emphasized autonomy and self-expression. Inglehart argued that rising prosperity was gradually liberating the publics of advanced industrial societies from the stress of basic acquisitive or materialistic needs. Observing that the younger people were much more likely to embrace postmaterialist values, Inglehart speculated that this silent revolution was not merely a case of a life-cycle change, with people becoming more materialist as they aged, but a genuine example of
generational replacement causing intergenerational value change.
Scarcity hypothesis Inglehart assumed that individuals pursue various goals in something akin to a hierarchical order. While people may universally aspire to freedom and autonomy, the most pressing material needs like hunger, thirst and physical security have to be satisfied first, since they are immediately linked with survival. According to Inglehart's interpretation of
Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of human goals ("
Maslow's hierarchy of needs"), while
scarcity prevails, these materialistic goals will have priority over postmaterialist goals like belonging, esteem, and aesthetic and intellectual satisfaction; however, once the satisfaction of the survival needs can be taken for granted, the focus will gradually shift to these "non-material" goods.
Socialization hypothesis The relationship between material conditions and value priorities is not one of immediate adjustment. A large body of evidence indicates that people's basic values are largely fixed when they reach adulthood, and change relatively little thereafter. Therefore,
cohorts which often experienced economic scarcity would
ceteris paribus (all things being equal) place a high value on meeting economic needs (such as valuing economic growth above protecting the environment) and on safety needs (will support more authoritarian styles of leadership, will exhibit strong feelings of national pride, will be strongly in favour of maintaining a large, strong army and will be more willing to sacrifice civil liberties for the sake of
law and order). On the other hand, cohorts who have experienced sustained high material affluence start to give high priority to values such as individual improvement,
personal freedom, citizen input in government decisions, the ideal of a society based on
humanism, and maintaining a clean and healthy environment.
Measuring postmaterialism There are several ways of empirically measuring the spread of postmaterialism in a society. A common and relatively simple way is by creating an index from survey respondents' patterns of responses to a series of items which were designed to measure personal political priorities. The theoretical assumptions and the empirical research connected with the concept of postmaterialism have received considerable attention and critical discussion in the human sciences. Amongst others, the
validity, stability, and
causation of postmaterialism has been doubted. The "Inglehart-index" has been included in several surveys (e.g.,
General Social Survey,
World Values Survey,
Eurobarometer,
ALLBUS, and Turning Points of the Life-Course). The
time series in ALLBUS (German General Social Survey) is particularly comprehensive. From 1980 to 1990, the share of "pure post-materialists" increased from 13% to 31% in
West Germany. After the economic and social stress caused by
German reunification in 1990, it dropped to 23% in 1992 and stayed on that level afterwards. The ALLBUS
sample from the less affluent population in
East Germany show much lower portions of postmaterialists (1991: 15%, 1992: 10%, 1998: 12%). International
data from the 2000 World Values Survey show the highest percentage of postmaterialists in Australia (35%), followed by Austria (30%), Canada (29%), Italy (28%), Argentina (25%), United States (25%), Sweden (22%), Netherlands (22%), and Puerto Rico (22%). In the early 21st century, the issue of a "second generation of postmaterialism" appearing on the scene of worldwide civil society, to a large extent conceived as their "positive ideological embodiment", was brought up by cultural scientist Roland Benedikter in his seven-volume book series
Postmaterialismus (2001–2005). As increasing postmaterialism is based on the abundance of material possessions or resources, it should not be mixed indiscriminately with
asceticism or general denial of consumption. In some way, postmaterialism may be described as supermaterialism. German data show that there is a tendency towards this orientation among young people, in the economically rather secure public service, and in the managerial middle class. ==See also==