Bibliographic record
Abstract
Introduction Inequality is a common topic in institutional policy discourse, and it has been defined in a variety of ways. However, there has only been limited consideration of its various operating meanings among the public itself. This paper examines the structure of inequality in the perceptions of Canadians and relates this to some general themes in institutional policy discourse on inequality. By institutional policy discourse we mean the discussions and ideas that surround the formal development of a particular policy area (Brooks, 2003, pp. 8-10: Howlett & Ramesh, 2003, pp. 121-122: John, 1998, pp. 157-159). Themes in policy discourse are associated with different phases of institutional and governmental ideas about inequality and which groups are most severely affected by it. While formal policy discourse may contain ideas about both objective and subjective aspects of inequality, public opinion about inequality is primarily subjective or perceptual in nature, although it can be influenced by both these elements. The four general and schematic hypotheses that guide the present work will be presented in detail later, in conjunction with results of analysis. All of these hypotheses concern the way in which themes of policy discourse on inequality relate to the structure of public opinion on inequality. Although there are schematic hypotheses underlying the work, the analysis involves both exploration and hypothesis testing. This arises from the generality of the hypotheses, subjective aspects of their interpretation, and from some aspects of the analytic techniques used. It is also worth noting that although the primary goal of the paper is an exploration and preliminary testing of the structure of Canadian opinion on inequality, our results may have broader implications. (1) Occasionally, theoretical sources from other countries are mentioned because formal policy discourse does sometimes draw on developments elsewhere. Theoretical Perspective The basic theory that drives the explanations offered here is that there is a series of historical stages in institutional public policy discourse concerning inequality, and these stages will be at least partially mirrored in the structure of popular opinions about inequality and public policy. While we cannot actually study the relationship between institutional public policy themes and mass public opinion on inequality over the passage of time, we can describe the emergence of themes in institutional policy discourse and see if that historical perspective is consistent with the current cross-sectional structure of public perceptions of inequality. In light of the above, it is important to define those stages of institutional policy discourse about inequality that we expect to find reflected in the structure of current public opinion. Policy discourse about inequality and the severity of inequality experienced by various groups, if viewed in terms of modern times, follows this sequence: * Inequality is not defined in highly abstract or objective terms, but is linked to ideas about the comparative advantages or disadvantages of different regions, cultural, linguistic or religious groups. * Inequality will be viewed in objective, abstract economic or statistical terms easily measured in terms of income deficiency, inequality indices or poverty rates. In some cases, highly aggregated pictures of the demographic concentration of income deficiency come into play here. * Inequality begins to be defined in terms that go significantly beyond economic or demographic indicators and have a highly symbolic, identity or rights-oriented aspect. We expect that elements of these stages of policy discourse will be reflected in the structure of public opinion about inequality in Canada. Note that opinions and discourse about some groups may be related to more than one of the above themes. …
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.004 | 0.010 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.004 | 0.008 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.028 | 0.016 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.009 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.004 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.008 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".