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Sociologists coined the term \"anomie\" to describe societies that are characterized by disintegration and deregulation. Extending beyond conceptualizations of anomie that conflate the measurements of anomie as 'a state of society' and as a 'state of mind', we disentangle these conceptualizations and develop an analysis and measure of this phenomenon focusing on anomie as a perception of the 'state of society'. We propose that anomie encompasses two dimensions: a perceived breakdown in social fabric (i.e., disintegration as lack of trust and erosion of moral standards) and a perceived breakdown in leadership (i.e., deregulation as lack of legitimacy and effectiveness of leadership). Across six studies we present evidence for the validity of the new measure, the Perception of Anomie Scale (PAS). Studies 1a and 1b provide evidence for the proposed factor structure and internal consistency of PAS. Studies 2a-c provide evidence of convergent and discriminant validity. Finally, assessing PAS in 28 countries, we show that PAS correlates with national indicators of societal functioning and that PAS predicts national identification and well-being (Studies 3a & 3b). The broader implications of the anomie construct for the study of group processes are discussed.

Societal inequality has been found to harm the mental and physical health of its members and undermine overall social cohesion. Here, we tested the hypothesis that economic inequality is associated with a wish for a strong leader in a study involving 28 countries from five continents (Study 1, N = 6,112), a study involving an Australian community sample (Study 2, N = 515), and two experiments (Study 3a, N = 96; Study 3b, N = 296). We found correlational (Studies 1 and 2) and experimental (Studies 3a and 3b) evidence for our prediction that higher inequality enhances the wish for a strong leader. We also found that this relationship is mediated by perceptions of anomie, except in the case of objective inequality in Study 1. This suggests that societal inequality enhances the perception that society is breaking down (anomie) and that a strong leader is needed to restore order (even when that leader is willing to challenge democratic values).

Purpose Expressional anomie (e.g. obscene words) can hinder communications and even obstruct improvements of national literacy. Meanwhile, the borderless and rapid transmission of the internet has exacerbated the influences. Hence, the purpose of this paper is detecting online anomic expression automatically and analyzing dynamic evolution processes of expressional anomie, so as to reveal multidimensional status of expressional anomie. Design/methodology/approach This paper conducted expressional anomie analysis via fine-grained microblog mining. Specifically, anomic microblogs and their anomic types were identified via a supervised classification method. Then, the evolutions of expressional anomie were analyzed, and impacts of users’ characteristics on the evolution process were mined. Finally, expressional anomie characteristics and evolution trends were obtained. Findings Empirical results on microblogs indicate that more effective and diversified measures need to be used to address the current large-scale anomie in expression. Moreover, measures should be tailored to individuals and local conditions. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, it is the first research to mine evolutions of expressional anomie automatically in social media. It may discover more continuous and universal rules of expressional anomie, so as to optimize the online expression environment.

Populism is usually studied by looking at the electoral and rhetorical strategies of parties considered to be populist. In contrast, this article attempts to measure the support for the core propositions of populism among voters and explain the social differences in that support. On the basis of a survey of the Dutch-speaking population of Belgium (N: 2,330) we find that this support for populism turns out not to be directly influenced by a weak or uncertain economic position, by dissatisfaction with personal life or feelings of anomie. Support for populism appears foremost as a consequence of a very negative view of the evolution of society – declinism – and of the feeling of belonging to a group of people that is unfairly treated by society.

Recent years have seen a sharp increase in empirical studies on the constrict claim: the hypothesized detrimental effect of ethnic diversity on most if not all aspects of social cohesion. Studies have scrutinized effects of different measures of ethnic heterogeneity in different geographical areas on different forms of social cohesion. The result has been a cacophony of empirical findings. We explicate mechanisms likely to underlie the negative relationship between ethnic heterogeneity and social cohesion: the homophily principle, feelings of anomie, group threat, and social disorganization. Guided by a clear conceptual framework, we structure the empirical results of 90 recent studies and observe three patterns. We find that (a) there is consistent support for the constrict claim for aspects of social cohesion that are spatially bounded to neighborhoods, (b) support for the constrict claim is more common in the United States than in other countries, and (c) ethnic diversity is not related to less interethnic social cohesion. We discuss the implications of these patterns.

In this study, we used the framework of institutional anomie theory (Messner and Rosenfeld in Crime and the American dream, Wadsworth, Delmont, CA, 2001; Rosenfeld and Messner in: Passas and Agnew (eds) The future of anomie theory, Northeastern University Press, Boston, 1997) to examine the relationship between supervisors' ethics and their personal value orientation, including achievement and pecuniary materialism. We further investigated whether these individual-level associations were moderated by societal factors consisting of income inequality, government efficiency, foreign competition, and technological advancement. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to analyze data of 16,464 supervisors from 42 nations obtained from the 2010–2014 wave of the World Values Survey. Results showed that strong achievement value orientation was positively related to willingness to justify ethically suspect behaviors; government efficiency and technological advancement, respectively, had negative and positive moderating effects on this relationship. On the other hand, foreign competition had a positive moderating effect on the association between pecuniary materialism and ethicality.

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine whether victims of financial crimes are also affected by anomie. Fraud from supposed financial advisors leaves many victims feeling uncertain of their financial future and betrayed by people they trusted. This is felt even more when victims are betrayed by people in their own community. Previous research (see Hövermann et al. 2015a, 2015b, 2016, 2018) has found that individuals susceptible to the capitalistic values of the USA and other Western nations are more likely to cheat (Muftic, 2006), engage in rule-breaking (Zito, 2018) and believe in egoistic individuality (Hövermann et al. 2015a). This belief in these values could also increase the chance of victimization. Design/methodology/approach The authors used an experimental survey to assess whether institutional anomie theory (IAT) can also affect victimization at the individual level. Findings The authors find support for Messner and Rosenfeld’s (2001) IAT. An interaction was present, which revealed that IAT is more predictive when individuals are high in financial need. When individuals are desperate, they will find whatever means possible to meet the expectations of the American Dream, even if it involves investing their life savings with a potential fraudster. Originality/value This paper examines IAT as it relates to victim behavior. Further, this paper links the techniques of offenders using shared social status (i.e. affinity) with criminological theory.

This study examined the direct influence of national economic condition, as well as the indirect effects through the strength of noneconomic institutions on supervisors' ethical reasoning using the institutional anomie theory developed by Messner and Rosenfeld (Soc Forces 75(4):1393-1416, 2001). Utilizing data of 20,025 supervisors across 52 countries, the analyses showed that high disparity in the economic distribution directly and indirectly leads to unethical values. High economic inequality in a country resulted in high tendency of supervisors to justify unethical acts. In addition, some of this influence went through the institutional strength of family, education, polity, and religion, thereby indicating partial mediation. As a result, the study presented the important roles of social institutions in explaining supervisors' attitude and behavior. The findings of this research contribute to the institutional anomie theory by clarifying the multilevel path of the macrostructures' conditions in explaining supervisors' ethicality. Moreover, since some of the relationships between variables resulted in the direction opposite to the propositions of the theory, this study suggested other theoretical models that may be integrated with IAT. Along with these theoretical contributions, practical implications to businesses and society are discussed to strengthen supervisors' ethics.

The experience of British citizens living in in France, Spain and Italy has been amply covered by researchers. However, very little attention has been given to British citizens living in Central and Eastern Europe. Moreover, although the impact of Brexit on Britons living in the EU has received some attention, the role of politics in general as a factor in unforced migration is relatively understudied. This paper draws on qualitative in-depth interviews conducted in the period 2019-2022 with 60 British citizens living long-term in Poland. It investigates the structural effects of politics in Poland and the UK and how its sliding doors have fostered or hindered UK citizens’ ability to move between the two countries since the political transformation of 1989. On a micro level, it also looks at the individual agency of British citizens and their attempts to negotiate the changing political landscape. This paper finds that anomic feelings connected to the political conditions in the UK have often been a contributory factor in the decision to move abroad. Despite widespread concerns about political illiberalism in Poland, the state of British politics today and the structural impact of Brexit, which prevents many citizens returning to the UK with their partners, as well as the ‘hostile environment’ for Polish migrants, fuel continuing disillusionment with the UK and a reluctance to return.

Economie inequality has been found to have pernicious effects, reducing mental and physical health, decreasing societal cohesion, and fueling support for nativist parties and illiberal autocratic leaders. We start this review with an outline of what social identity theorizing offers to the study of inequality. We then articulate four hypotheses that can be derived from the social identity approach: the fit hypothesis, the wealth-categorization hypothesis, the wealth-stereotype hypothesis, and the sociostructural hypothesis. We review the empirical literature that tests these hypotheses by exploring the effect of economic inequality, measured objectively by metrics such as the Gini coefficient as well as subjectively in terms of perceptions of economic inequality, on wealth categorization (of others and the self), the desire for more wealth and status, intergroup hostility, attitudes towards immigrants, prosocial behavior, stereotyping, the wish for a strong leader, the endorsement of conspiracy theories, and collective action intentions. As we will show, this research suggests that economic inequality may have even more far-reaching consequences than commonly believed. Indeed, investigating the effects of economic inequality on citizens' sociopolitical behaviors may be increasingly important in today's turbulent political and social landscape.