Moral Intuitions and Political Orientations among Norwegian Voters

Abstract

Can individual’s moral intuitions shed light on political and ideological orientations in the population? We present Moral Foundations Theory (MFT) and conduct the first study of MFT’s explanatory power in a Norwegian context. We test the validity of a Norwegian translation of the Moral Foundations Questionnaire, the central survey instrument for measuring moral foundations, and find support for a five-factor model that also describes a clear divide between moral universalism (care and fairness) and moral particularism (ingroup loyalty, authority, and sanctity). We further examine how these moral configurations relate to political left-right orientation, party and party-leadership preferences, and views on key political issues such as tax and immigration. We find, like previous research from other countries, that people with a left-wing orientation are high on moral universalism and low on particularism, while those with a right-wing orientation equate universalist and particularist intuitions to a greater extent. Moral foundations explain more of the variation in political orientation than education, indicating that the theory can shed useful light on political behavior.