Geographical Divides in Protectionism : The Social Context Approach

Previous studies on public opinion of trade liberalization have looked at factors such as individuals' socioeconomic status and sociotropic economic evaluations. However, they overlook one important factor: social geography. In this paper, we argue that people in different areas are exposed to (i) social networks of different characteristics and (ii) distinct news coverage from local media, which lead to distinct opinions on international trade. We examine these hypotheses using public opinion surveys and media data in Japan. First, we demonstrate that individuals in rural areas are less likely to support trade liberalization and Japan's membership in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Next, we investigate the mechanisms, showing that (a) an individual whose communication network involves people working for the primary sector, which is considered to be vulnerable to trade liberalization in Japan, tends to oppose free trade regardless of the industry they work for and that (b) newspapers circulated in rural and urban places tend to cover TPP differently, which also impacts people's attitudes toward the agreement