Crisis Factors in the Socio-Political System of West Berlin (Population Survey 1981)

Political attitudes in the West Berlin population and judgement on
parties as well as politicians.

Topics: satisfaction with the political system; political interest;
intent to participate in the impending election to the Berlin House of
Representatives; reasons for abstention from the election; point in
time and certainty of one´s voting decision; behavior at the polls in
the last (1979) and voting intent in the impending election to the
Berlin House of Representatives (first vote and second vote, ballot
procedure); satisfaction with top candidates of one´s preferred party;
party preference (rank order procedure); sympathy scale for the SPD,
CDU, FDP, AL (Alternative List) and SEW (socialist Unity Party West
Berlin) as well as for top Berlin politicians; satisfaction scale for
the coalition partners in the senate, SPD and FDP, as well as for the
CDU in the opposition; preferred mayor; support of collection of
signatures for an early election (signature under the AL list or CDU
list); election prognosis for the Alternative List; desirability of
taking seats in Parliament by AL representatives; attitude to an
absolute majority for one party; preferred government composition;
postmaterialism (scale); attitude to house occupations; judgement on
the conduct of senate and police regarding house occupiers;
self-assessment on a left-right continuum; most important political
goals for Berlin and for the development of society in general;
attitude to women´s initiatives; attitude to a stronger expansion of
the welfare state; securing of peace; judgement on the Berlin aid of
the Federal Government; assumed attitudes of the Germans to Berlin;
remaining in Berlin even in case of closing of the access roads;
political participation (scales: conduct in the past as well as
possible conduct in the future); assumed readiness for action of the
western powers for the freedom of West Berlin; prediction of the
election result;

Demography: age; sex; marital status; religious denomination;
frequency of church attendance; school education; occupational
position; employment; respondent is head of household; characteristics
of head of household; residential status; union membership;
self-assessment of social class; local residency in Berlin and influx
from other parts of Germany; social origins; party inclination; party
identification; dominant occupational group in residential area;
residential status.

Interviewer rating: presence of other persons during the interview and
their relation to the respondent; interventions by these persons in the
course of the interview; reliability and willingness of respondent to
cooperate; time and number of contact attempts; length of interview and
date of interview.

Also encoded were: identification of interviewer; interviewer age and
sex of interviewer; employment; school degree and length of occupation
as interviewer with MARPLAN.

The following data on the respective region of the respondent were
added: voting district result in 1979; proportion of foreigners.

Indices: a series of indices resulting from the survey content are
included in the data set as reference numbers, as e.g.:
postmaterialism; violence potential; house occupier scale; workplace
and ecology; participation; security; alternative movement; type of
participation.

Finally further information was added depending on demographic
characteristics of the respondent: start of socialization; government
system and economic period during the primary socialization phase of
respondent; end of socialization phase; unemployment rates during the
various socialization phases.