Some political scientists and psychologists believe that there is a close relationship between the politics that we practice and our genetic makeup. While not entirely disregarding the “non-natural” world in the formation of our political values, they posit that genes may play an important role in determining our politics by driving us towards certain “natural tendencies”. This approach, of course, is not without its critics (PDF).

Not having any training as a scientist, I wonder how one might go about connecting social behavior to genes in a way that would be scientifically rigorous. These studies have all been conducted with adults in the short-term, not with a fetus that has grown into an adult over the long-term. Establishing the existence of a gene prior to socialization, and not its content, and then concluding that these genes account for our political behavior seems highly spurious. How would we determine the causality - what is shaping what - between our environmentally-influenced social values and our seemingly fixed genetic makeup?

0 Recommend this Post
      view other notable posts

Matthew Lymburner is an MA student at the Institute of Political Economy, Carleton University. He is interested in Brazilian history and political economy, and progressive politics worldwide.
Email this author | Profile and posts by Matthew Lymburner

Email this Post
Citation Styles
Print this Post
Save as PDF
Share & Bookmark