The effects of historical events on SES gaps and levels of political discussion: quasi-experimental evidence from the German Reunification period

The literature suggests that moments of heightened political uncertainty, or “eventful times,” carry strong attitudinal impacts but limited capacity to affect civic engagement. I revisit this view by investigating the impact of eventful times on interpersonal political discussion. I contend that, due to age- and socioeconomic-status differences in political interest and the use of political contextual information, eventful periods produce heterogeneous increases in political discussion. Among younger individuals, these increases are substantial and reduce SES disparities in political discussion; among adults, they are more moderate and unequalizing. I find empirical support for this argument by comparing West Germany and France with respect to how age and socioeconomic attributes predict political discussion before and during German Reunification. I introduce an original quantitative indicator of eventfulness and show that this comparison approximates a difference-in-differences quasi-experimental design, addressing validity concerns related to historical confounding and ambiguous causal ordering.