What is the role of “Culture” for conceptualization in Political Psychology ? Presentation of a dialogical model of lay thinking in two cultural contexts

To be published: Magioglou, h., (2013). «  Democracy as an open ended question: a model on lay thinking grounded in two cultural contexts ». In h. Magioglou (ed.), Culture and Political Psychology: a societal perspective. Charlotte, NC, Information Age Publishing, 2013.

This paper is discussing the role of conceptualization in political psychology and the limits that the notion of culture imposes: is it possible to construct “useful” theoretical models that ofer new perspectives? What is their scope and possibility for generalization? I suggest a dialogical model of lay thinking that is grounded on a longitudinal study (from 2000 to 2010) regarding the social representation of Greek Youth for democracy (Magioglou 2008; 2013). his model, and the research method adopted, have been constructed for the Greek context, as a result of the interaction between ield work, data analysis and the conceptual tools available at the time. It is then tried for a diferent study and context: that of the commentaries left on line after the articles of three major French newspapers (Le Monde, Le Figaro, Libération), from 2009 to 2010 considering the case of the arrest, trial and liberation of a French citizen in Iran, with the accusation of being a spy, after the elections of 2009.