bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Deliberative Households: Republicans, Liberals, and the Public-Private Split
Authors: Gerson Gal
Published: January 2007

This article is concerned with the relationship between feminism on the one hand, and republicanism and liberalism on the other hand. Feminism is interested in dissolving the private-public boundary by politicizing the home and challenging role divisions within it. Some scholars have suggested advancing this project by importing the republican view of political contest as a good in itself: no claim to privacy may stand against it, so that received family structures may be exposed to debate and change. In contrast to such views, I argue that a perception of the home as a ground on which autonomous actors meet for open-ended engagement is incompatible with republicanism, and that republican ideas, in their turn, undermine efforts to open up the private sphere for deliberation. On the other hand, the liberal focus on protecting individuality provides a basis for deliberation in the home and so is compatible with the idea of persistent contestation in multiple arenas.
Drawing Lobbyists to Washington: Government Activity and the Demand for Advocacy
Authors: Leech Beth L. , Baumgartner Frank R. , La Pira Timothy M. , Semanko Nicholas A.
Published: January 2007

Using an agenda-setting approach, we show the interaction between the growth of groups and the growth of government. A pooled time-series analysis of more than 45,000 lobby registration reports from 1996 to 2000 and measures of government activity from the Policy Agendas Project indicates that groups become active in Washington, D.C., in large part because of pre-existing levels of government activity in the issue-areas that concern them. The growth in the range and number of activities of government has created incentives for organizations of all kinds to mobilize, whether they are supporters or opponents of new government programs. We find that levels of government attention in an issue-area explain the level of interest-group lobbying more consistently than does government spending or the number of business firms in that area. We conclude with a discussion of the need for theories of group mobilization to include attention to the demand-creating actions of government itself.
A Natural Experiment of Race-Based and Issue Voting: The 2001 City of Los Angeles Elections
Authors: Abrajano Marisa A. , Alvarez R. Michael
Published: January 2007

The theory of racially polarized voting suggests that race is a primary determinant of vote choice in elections where a minority candidate is pitted against a white candidate. The spatial model of voting suggests that voters consider the issue positions of candidates and choose the candidate closest to their own positions. The unique context of the 2001 Los Angeles city election allows us to test these two theories. In each of two races in this election, a Latino candidate competed against a white candidate. In one race the white candidate was considered more liberal, while in the other race the Latino candidate was seen as more liberal. This particular ethnic and ideological composition provides us with a natural experimenting which to test the two competing theories. While voter ethnicity mattered, we show that consistent with the spatial model, voters also relied on issues and ideology as factors in their voting choices. By considering the choices voters are making in two different elections, we argue that estimates of the extent of racial voting in previous research may be overstated.
The Political Economy of Simultaneous Transitions: An Empirical Test of Two Models
Authors: Slantchev Branislav L.
Published: January 2007

Traditional political economy emphasizes the difficulty of conducting simultaneous transitions toward market economy and democratic government. There are two major theories that seek to explain why some reform programs are never fully implemented or are reversed shortly after their inception. The J-Curve model (JCM) (Przeworski 1993) implicates the short-term losers from reform as the major opposition, and the Partial Reform Equilibrium model (PREM) (Hellman 1998) implicates the winners. I subject the models to empirical analysis with data from 25 post-communist countries and find that the data do not support the contention of the JCM. High unemployment rates do not threaten the survival of reform programs, and government instability does not necessarily translate into bad economic policies. These results suggest that the common concern that socially costly economic reforms endanger the consolidation of democratic norms may be misplaced.
Beyond the Roll-Call Arena: The Determinants of Position Taking in Congress
Authors: Highton Benjamin , Rocca Michael S.
Published: January 2007

Most analyses of position taking in Congress focus on roll-call voting, where members of Congress (MCs) regularly cast votes, thereby regularly taking positions. Left largely unstudied has been position taking beyond the domain of rollcall voting. However, analyzing non-roll-call position taking raises interesting theoretical questions. Whereas most members cannot avoid taking positions (casting votes) on roll calls, outside the roll-call arena MCs have more discretion; they must decide whether or not to take a position at all. And, while roll-call voting is directly tied to policy consequences, the connection is weaker in non-roll-call position taking. These two distinguishing features of non-roll-call position taking motivate a variety of hypotheses about who takes positions and what positions they take. Our results reveal strong constituency links to both phenomena. The results also imply that party influence is greater on roll-call position taking. We interpret these findings in the context of leading theories of congressional behavior.
Racial/Ethnic Group Attitudes Toward Environmental Protection in California: Is “Environmentalism” Still a White Phenomenon?
Authors: Whittaker Matthew , Segura Gary M , Bowler Shaun
Published: January 2007

One view of minority opinion on environmental issues suggests that minority voters are focused on less esoteric concerns such as education, jobs, and crime. An alternative argument is that minorities, many of whom live proximate to the sources of pollution and environmental degradation, are actually more concerned. Focusing here on Latinos, we argue that minority concern about environmental issues is endogenous to the nature of the issue and has changed over time. Specifically, we suggest that increasing environmental awareness among minorities has led Latinos to become more sensitive to environmental issues than their white counter-parts over time, but that this difference is manifest only on issues of proximate concern to Latinos and not on more abstract environmental principles. Pooling Field Polls in California across a 21-year span, we model support for various pro-environment positions among Latino, African-American, and non-Hispanic white respondents. We find considerable empirical support for the dynamics of growing minority environmental concern among Latinos, but only weak evidence for a similar trend among African-Americans.
Beliefs and Perceived Influence in a Natural Resource Conflict: An Advocacy Coalition Approach to Policy Networks
Authors: Weible Christopher M.
Published: January 2007

To what extent do stakeholders in a conflict over natural resources interact with actors of congruent policy core beliefs or with actors who have perceived influence? The response to this question is structured principally by the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) using questionnaire and interview data collected from stakeholders involved in California Marine Protected Area policy. The findings indicate that shared beliefs are the best predictor for policy network relationships, supporting the ACF. Perceived influence, while less important than shared beliefs, is another significant predictor.
Democratic Progress and Regress: The Effect of Parties on the Transitions of States to and Away from Democracy
Authors: Lai Brian , Melkonian-Hoover Ruth
Published: January 2007

This article examines how political parties and party competition affect the likelihood of nations becoming and remaining democracies. While many scholars have long assumed that this is the case, the roles of parties and party competition are indeed affected, such a likelihood has rarely been examined rigorously in cross-national evaluations. In addition to examining the links between parties and political transitions, our analysis controls for other factors purported to have a significant effect on democratization. To test the effects of parties and party competition on the transition to and survival of democracies and autocracies, this article utilizes event history analysis on all countries in political transition between the years of 1950-1992, using three different measures of democracy. Through this multifaceted and unique approach, we are able to demonstrate that across all three measures of democracy, parties do indeed play an important role in causing authoritarian states to transition to democracy and helping democratic nations remain democracies.
Institutional Foundations of the President’s Issue Agenda
Authors: Yates Jeff , Whitford Andrew
Published: January 2007

In this study, we focus on an unresolved problem in our understanding of the construction of the presidential issue agenda: how to reconcile the president’s responsiveness to public opinion with his institutionalized electoral cycle. We argue that the president’s responsiveness is contingent: that the president allocates agenda space to discretionary issues when the strength of public opinion is high and the electoral cycle dictates responsiveness. We provide evidence for this claim by simultaneously addressing the potential influence of other relevant political actors, intra-administration considerations, and objective phenomena in the case of the president’s attention to crime issues over the second half of the twentieth century. Our statistical models show that while the president also responds to cues from other political actors, executive attention to public opinion depends on the president’s electoral circumstances. At the same time, because crime is a discretionary issue, we also find that presidents adjust their agenda to address competing domestic priorities.
Gubernatorial Coattail Effects in State Legislative Elections
Authors: Hogan Robert E.
Published: January 2007

This work explores the influence of gubernatorial coattails in state legislative elections. Through a district-level analysis conducted in nine states, I measure how party support for the governor affects the percentage of the vote received by candidates running for the legislature. Findings indicate that gubernatorial coattails do influence candidate vote margins, even when factors such as campaign spending, past party performance, and other district-level conditions are controlled. However, the magnitude of this effect is mitigated by candidacy status and the closeness of the gubernatorial election. Specifically, coattail effects are dampened by the presence of an incumbent, while their influence is enhanced in states with competitive gubernatorial elections.
Working on the Democratic Imagination and the Limits of Deliberative Democracy
Authors: Chambers Samuel A.
Published: January 2007

Now is not a period of “normal science” for the field of political theory, whatever we (or Kuhn 1970) might mean by that phrase. Many political theorists will today be found toiling in fields that ostensibly belong to other disciplines, and some of the best work done “in” political theory proves interdisciplinary by its very nature. The essays in this symposium offer a vibrant cross-section of what one might then call the “new” political theory: they exemplify the diversity of writing that currently marks the field of political theory. They are impressively broad in scope yet powerfully concrete in their implications. In their diversity, they show us something absolutely crucial about the practice of political theory today. But the pieces collected here also prove to be marginal in a number of important senses. They live and breathe “at the edge” of political theory in those spaces where they have easier access to other fields. They run the risk of further marginalization by posing unexpected questions and by suggesting unconventional responses. At their core lies a refusal of the standard themes and the typical problems of political theory. They come together to find common ground only from their respective margins of the subfield. Thus, they share the project of not only operating at those margins but also working on them. Perhaps this is precisely the type of work that the “new” political theory must do today. In this essay I argue that such a project always proves to be a labor of imagination. Imagination must be considered here neither as flight of fancy, nor disregard of reality; imagination cannot be reduced to representation. The power of imagination is a synthetic power of creation and of reconstruction—an ability to combine the uncombinable, to surpass binaries without merely collapsing them, to fashion something new. “Working on the democratic imagination” means, then, to think the limits (and their transgression) of democratic theory and of democracy as well.
On the Popular Vote
Authors: Williams Juliet A.
Published: January 2007

Over the past few years, voting has become a central dramatic element on a variety of shows in the highly successful reality TV genre. Treating the “voting drama” as a shadow realm to the political, one in which anxieties and tensions produced by the practice of democracy are given free play, this essay offers a critical consideration of some of the hidden aspects of the cultural and social significance of political voting.
The Dynamic Relationship Between Protest and Repression
Authors: Carey Sabine C.
Published: January 2007

This study contributes to our understanding of the dynamic relationship between protest and repression. It employs vector autoregressions to analyze daily data from six Latin American and three African countries from the late 1970s to the early 1990s. The results suggest that there is a reciprocal relationship between protest and repression and that protest is consistent over time. Democracies were found to be most likely to accommodate the opposition and, at the same time, were least likely to display continuous repressive behavior. However, if faced with popular dissent, democracies were just as likely to respond with negative sanctions as other regime types, whereas negative sanctions were particularly unsuccessful to solicit dissident cooperation in democracies.
Presidential Campaigns and the Knowledge Gap in Three Transitional Democracies
Authors: McCann James A. , Lawson Chappell
Published: January 2007

Analysis of panel data from Brazil, Mexico, and Russia suggests that presidential campaigns have ambiguous effects on inequalities in political knowledge. In all three countries, the “knowledge gap” among citizens with different levels of socioeconomic resources stayed the same or widened. At the same time, less affluent and educated citizens who paid a great deal of attention to the campaign learned more than equally attentive high-status citizens. These findings suggest that modern, media-intensive electoral campaigns do provide information to low socioeconomic status citizens in readily digestible form, but they fail to stimulate sufficient attention to politics among these citizens to close the knowledge gap.
“Neighborhood” Influence on the Formation of National Identity in Taiwan: Spatial Regression with Disjoint Neighborhoods
Authors: Lin Tse-Min , Wu Chin-En , Lee Feng-Yu
Published: January 2007

This article argues that, like fashion, national identity may be influenced by “neighbors” in a broadly defined sense. Inspired by models of collective choice, we hypothesize that, in Taiwan, a subethnically divided society facing a dilemma in its relationship with China, township residents and occupational peers are subject to mutual influence in the formation of their national identity. Methodologically, we compare spatial regression with dummy variable regression and hierarchical linear models. Based on spatial regression with survey data, our findings show that the formation of national identity in Taiwan indeed exhibits strong neighborhood influence.
Not for Members Only: Group Endorsements as Electoral Information Cues
Authors: Mcdermott Monika L
Published: January 2007

Endorsements by groups in American politics have typically been studied as voting cues only for members of the given organization. Using both the formal theoretical and low-information cognitive voting literatures, this article argues for a broader electoral role for group endorsements. Specifically, if groups that have clear ideological or policy preferences endorse candidates, these endorsements should provide all voters with ideological or issue information about the endorsed candidates. This inferred information should then impact voters’ behavior, especially in low-information scenarios. Using both an experimental test and a test with American National Election Studies (ANES) survey data, this study analyzes the hypothesis in terms of elections to the U.S. House of Representatives. It finds that when the AFL-CIO endorses Democratic candidates, voters behave as though a liberal message has been sent—liberals are significantly more supportive while conservatives are significantly less supportive than they are when no endorsement is given, regardless of whether or not they are union members. At the same time, however, the analysis finds no support that endorsements of Republicans have any ideological impact on voting.
Political, Economic, and Social Consequences of Foreign Military Intervention
Authors: Pickering Jeffrey , Kisangani Emizet F.
Published: January 2007

Foreign military intervention is one of the most common types of interstate military force used over recent decades. As war’s costliness increases and the efficacy of economic sanctions and other foreign policy tools is increasingly questioned, it may become even more prevalent. Unfortunately, the field of international relations has little systematic understanding of the types of impacts such military ventures can have on target states in the developing world. In PCSE AR1 regressions of 106 developing countries from 1960 to 2002, we find that large scale foreign military interventions, which have over 1000 intervening troops, do not leave a significant imprint on governing institutions, economic growth rates, or physical quality of life in developing democracies. The same cannot be said for non-democratic states in the developing world. Hostile interventions can help to democratize non-democratic targets, while rival interventions lay the groundwork for long-term economic growth.
External Threats and Political Tolerance in Taiwan
Authors: Wang T. Y. , Chang G. Andy
Published: January 2007

Political tolerance is a significant issue for democracies under external threats. When imposed dangers are felt by citizens of the polity, competitors for political power are likely to believe that they are engaging in political battles of a zero-sum nature, having a life or death consequence. Because Taiwan is under constant military pressure from China, it is an excellent case for an analysis of political tolerance in a democracy that is threatened by external forces. Employing recently collected survey data, this study finds that the majority of Taiwanese residents show a willingness to extend rights of citizenship to others in the polity on the most salient issue that divides them. However, the perceived threats from Beijing’s claims to the island and from the Taiwan independence movement have had negative impacts on the citizens’ level of tolerance. The finding of this study will have important policy implications for Taiwan’s young democracy and will also hold significant theoretical implications for the study of political tolerance under threats.
High-Conflict Television News and Public Opinion
Authors: Forgette Richard , Morris Jonathan S.
Published: January 2007

This research assesses whether conflict-laden news coverage affects public perceptions of political institutions and political elites in general. Particularly, is conflict-oriented television news coverage of politics contributing to negative evaluations of political institutions and their leaders? We present evidence from an experiment designed to address this question. Our experiment is constructed around media coverage of the State of the Union Address. We control for the source of news (CNN), and examine how CNN’s Crossfire and Inside Politics’ coverage and analyses of the State of the Union Address influenced the attitudes and perceptions of viewers. We find that conflict-laden television coverage decreases public evaluations of political institutions, trust in leadership, and overall support for political parties and the system as a whole. Our findings have implications for public opinion in an era of increased abundance of high-conflict cable news talk shows that turn the political process into a contact sport.
Patterns of Change in the Use of Imprisonment in the American States: An Integration of Path Dependence, Punctuated Equilibrium and Policy Design Approaches
Authors: Schneider Anne Larason
Published: January 2007

This study analyzes changes from 1927 through 2003 in the use of incarceration by the American States, testing propositions derived from path dependency/punctuated equilibrium theory and from an extension of the social construction theory of policy design. The results suggest that incarceration changes often were path dependent, but that periods of equilibrium-type change with up and down adjustments also were relatively common until a critical juncture occurred in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The results also show that the states tended to change in the same direction, at the same time, as if some kind of national policy mood was important, even though incarceration rates are produced by state-level decisionmakers working in many different types of state and local institutional settings. The results confirm the proposition from the social construction theory of policy design that upward paths will be more common, last longer, more extreme, and harder to break than downward ones. Analysis of the public opinion variables most closely related to the social construction of law breakers indicates that small year-to-year changes were not very useful in explaining annual rates of incarceration change. On the other hand, a very rapid movement toward a more negative social construction may have been one of the factors important in triggering the critical juncture that occurred in all states. And, an exceptionally high and “sticky” negative construction of criminals extending for more than 30 years may be important in understanding the “stickiness” of institutions that produce incarceration rates.
Picking Their Spots: Minor Party Candidates in Gubernatorial Elections
Authors: Lem Steve B. , Dowling Conor M.
Published: January 2007

Given the institutional bias against minor parties in the U.S., why do minor party candidates run for office? In this article, we seek to answer this question by developing a model of the choice to participate in gubernatorial elections by minor party candidates that takes into account both the political opportunities potential candidates have to participate and the legal hurdles they must overcome to do so. We test our theory using an event count model of the number of minor party candidates in gubernatorial elections from 1982 to 2000. We find that state electoral rules, such as ballot access restrictions, and the level of competition between the two major parties within the state matter the most. In other words, the decision to run as a third party gubernatorial candidate may be an individual one but it is structured in important ways by the institutional environment within which those decisions are made.
Party, Ideology, and Vote Intentions: Dynamics from the 2002 French Electoral Panel
Authors: Bèlanger Èric , Lewis-Beck Michael S. , Chiche Jean , Tiberj Vincent
Published: January 2007

The debate over the relative importance of ideology versus party for vote choice in France is enduring. Resolution of the debate would have much value, for the light shed on sources of stability and change in multiparty electoral systems generally. The main reason the debate continues is that previous studies examining that question have been plagued by difficulties pertaining to variable measurement, model specification, election type, and research design. We address these problems and provide new evidence from the 2002 French Electoral Panel. Most notably, these data allow stronger causal inference because party identification and ideological identification are both measured in the first wave of the survey, that is, before the declaration of vote actually occurs. We estimate a multi-equation model of first-round legislative vote intention—as measured in the second wave of the panel—using two-stage least squares, ordered logit, as well as binomial and multinomial logit techniques. The results indicate that ideological identification systematically outweighs party identification in shaping the French voter’s choice.
Enduring Effects of the Uniform: Previous Military Experience and Voting Turnout
Authors: Teigen Jeremy M.
Published: January 2007

Military service has the capacity to inculcate members with politically relevant traits that influence political participation later in life. Results from three decades of pooled national cross-sectional data among males indicate that previous experience with the military, the most controlling and least democratic facet of American democracy, has a largely positive effect on turnout propensity. For WWII, Korean War, and post-conscription era veterans, previous military service positively influences turnout when compared to contemporaries without military service, while Vietnam-era veterans exhibited lower turnout rates than non-veteran peers. Evidence suggests that socialization effects rival self-selection bias in explaining increased veteran turnout.
Political Similarity and American Foreign Trade Patterns
Authors: Dixon William J. , Moon Bruce E.
Published: January 2007

International economic flows have become an increasingly prominent component of both international relations and domestic politics over the last two decades. Even though politically motivated governments have played a growing role in shaping these transactions, empirical studies have largely ignored the political determinants of international trade patterns. This study addresses that important gap in our understanding of the international political economy with particular reference to United States trade. We theorize that two aspects of the relations between nations should predict enhanced trade levels: similarity in political system and similarity in foreign policy orientation. We test this proposition for U.S. exports to 76 importing nations over an 18-year period in a pooled time- series design that controls for known influences on trade flows. Our results suggest that these two political factors have a substantial and predictable impact on U.S. export patterns. We consider some possible criticisms of our results along with some suggestions for future research.
Burke and India: The Failure of the Theory of Trusteeship
Authors: Conniff James
Published: January 2007

Edmund Burke's involvement in Indian politics forced him to reconsider one of the central concepts of his political thought: his theory of trusteeship. During the course of the debate over India, Burke came to realize that the theory could not work there because the Indians shared few political values with their English rulers and were unable to call those rulers to account. He, therefore, revised his approach to appeal to a natural law standard and to make the English Parliament and people surrogates for the Indians. However, these devices also failed, for the former proved unenforceable and the latter was undermined by the House of Lords' acquittal of Hastings. The theory of trusteeship thus proved to be critically defective, for, without greater popular accountability than Bruke was willing to permit, it failed to provide government which was both effective and responsible.
Rallying Around the Flag and Partisan Change: The Case of the Persian Gulf War
Authors: Norrander Barbara , Wilcox Clyde
Published: January 2007

The Persian Gulf war boosted President George Bush's popularity in the classic rally-around-the-flag pattern. This paper explores whether such a rally has additional effects by influencing partisan attachments. We find that small shifts in party indentification and slightly larger changes in party affect can be explained by people's reactions to the Gulf war. Thus foreign policy rallies can be added to the growing list of variables which explain fluctuations in party identification.
Land of the Fee: Entrance Fees and the National Park Service
Authors: Lowry William R.
Published: January 2007

What are the implications of increasing a public agency's ability to generate its own revenue for political control of the bureaucracy? This article uses historical cases of public land user fees to argue that, under certain conditions, such a change, rather than increasing agency autonomy, actually facilitates congressional intervention and control. Specifically, if the revenue increase carries no guarantees of increased appropriations and maintained levels of discretion, then old funds are supplanted by new funds with new strings attached. I illustrate the argument by examining the impacts of increased entrance fees on the National Park Service in recent years.
The Effects of Leadership Positions on Votes for Incumbents in State Legislative Elections
Authors: Holbrook Thomas M. , Tidmarch Charles M.
Published: January 2007

This paper investigates the impact of holding a party leadership position or being a committee chair on votes for incumbents in state legislative elections in 1986. The results of the analysis indicate that majority party members who hold these positions of authority enjoy a greater electoral advantage than expected in their states. Leadership positions do not offer the same advantage to minority party legislators, however.
Congress, Social Movements and Public Opinion: Multiple Origins of Women's Rights Legislation
Authors: Costain Anne N. , Majstorovic Steven
Published: January 2007

Scholars often characterize congressional response to public opinion as either reflecting opinion and legislating accordingly or manipulating opinion for political ends. When the wider political environment contains an active, high-profile social movement with rapid shifts in public opinion occurring, the relationship between Congress and opinion appears to be less unidimensional than these options suggest. To test the relationship between Congress and public opinion on women's rights issues, we first coded and factor analyzed New York Times events data chronicling the degree of agitation on behalf of women's rights, 1950-86. We then compiled data examining legislative activity on laws addressing women as a group and public opinion about women's political role. These measures were used to evaluate alternative interpretations of the relationship between Congress and public opinion. Using a three-stage least squares model reinforced by several case studies of congressional activity on laws addressing women's issues, we conclude that during the time when there was an active women's movement, the relationship between Congress and public opinion was reciprocal. Congress and the women's movement competed for leadership of public opinion. Congress both led opinion and followed it, bringing about change that was swifter and less predictable than in normal periods of interest group politics.
Cognitive Efficiency and the Congressional Vote: The Psychology of Coattail Voting
Authors: Mondak Jeffery J. , McCurley Carl
Published: January 2007

Most recent studies of presidential coattails have attempted to specify the prevalence of coattail voting. In contrast, in this treatment we attempt to identify the psychological mechanism underlying the coattail effect. Our interpretation is that the coattail effect results from voters' reliance on a specific cognitive efficiency mechanism, heuristic processing. Using NES data from the 1976-88 presidential elections, we conduct a multi-level analysis of factors influencing the congressional vote choice. We find that coattail voting varies with attributes of both the individual voter and of the electoral context. These results are consistent with our argument that voters with high need for cognitive efficiency use their evaluations of presidential candidates as cues to guide the decision regarding which House candidate to support.
Legislative Leadership Over Time
Authors: Schroedel Jean Reith
Published: January 2007

An extensive body of work has tried to assess changes in the relative power of Congress and the president in passing new laws. Most of this work has used the lenses provided by modernization theory and political time theory to explain shifts in the political balance of power. In this paper I provide evidence to show that the long neglected constitutional approach is at least as important as the others if we wish to understand the relative legislative power of the two branches of government over time.
Political Talk Radio: A Stereotype Reconsidered
Authors: Hofstetter C. Richard , Donovan Mark C. , Klauber Melville R. , Cole Alexandra , Huie Carolyn J. , Yuasa Toshiyuki
Published: January 2007

Despite its popularity and controversial character, few studies of political talk radio have been conducted. Little evidence for the hypothesis that political talk radio leads to alienation, social and political isolation, cynicism, and political withdrawal was found among a population-based sample of 525 adults in San Diego, California. Respondents reported widespread exposure to talk radio, although they often did not discriminate accurately among political, nonpolitical, and other program ming. Exposure was associated with traditional forms of political participation, beliefs in self-efficacy linked to specific political behaviors, and psychological involvement in politics. Increased penetration of the public may have altered the nature of the political talk radio audience so that exposure to talk radio is more closely associated with customary forms of political involvement than with social and political alienation.
Reward Without Punishment: Economic Conditions and the Vote
Authors: Radcliff Benjamin
Published: January 2007

It is often suggested that voter dissatisfaction is a more important determi nant of behavior than satisfaction. In the familiar terms of economic voting this negativity bias implies that voters are more likely to punish than reward incumbents for the status of the economy. However, economic conditions affect not only how people vote but whether they vote, such that during periods of poor economic performance much of the public resentment toward the in-party is absorbed by abstention (Rosenstone 1982). Thus, the impact of recession is muted by the reduced propensity of those suf fering its effects to actually vote Given this fact, it appears that the presi dent's party is more consistently rewarded for its economic successes than it is punished for its failures.
Monitoring Unemployment Benefits in Comparative Perspective
Authors: Tsebelis George , Stephen Roland
Published: January 2007

Most economic theories predict a rise in unemployment when unemploy ment benefits increase. The reason is that more people will be willing to exit from work, and fewer people will enter the workforce, when benefits are high. We argue that these theories oversimplify the situation because they do not take into account the way benefits are monitored. We present a model of monitoring benefits which leads to three conclusions that are different from standard economic theory: (1) Size of unemployment benefit has no effect on unemployment; (2) Duration of unemployment benefit has a positive effect on unemployment; (3) Size of unemployment benefit has a positive effect on the monitoring of benefits. We present historical evidence in favor of these propositions from a series of countries, and test them cross-nationally with Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) data.
Tracking Public Mood in the Supreme Court: Cross-Time Analyses of Criminal Procedure and Civil Rights Cases
Authors: Link Michael W.
Published: January 2007

Representational models of judicial decision making posit that the Supreme Court is a permeable institution, subject to external pressures-namely elite and mass opinion. Court rulings, therefore, should be demonstrably congruent with the views of the majoritarian electoral/political alliance. Building upon an innovative study by Mishler and Sheehan (1993), the relationship between public and elite attitudes and Supreme Court rulings are examined in two important issue areas: criminal procedure and race- related civil rights. The results indicate that permeability of the Court varies to some degree according to issue area. While public opinion (in the pre- Reagan years) has a direct affect on Supreme Court liberalism in both issue areas, the direct impact of elite opinion is evidenced only in the area of criminal procedure, not in the area of race-related civil rights. The relation ship between public opinion and Court liberalism during the Reagan years, however, is negative as the gap between liberalism in the public "mood" and in Court decisions has widened. These nuances in the relationship between the Supreme Court and the broader sociopolitical environment indicate that the Court does follow changes in the dominant political alliance more readily in some issue areas than it does in others.
Different Contents, Similar Packages: The Domestic Political Beliefs of Southern Local Party Activists
Authors: Clarke Harold D. , Feigert Frank B. , Stewart Marianne C.
Published: January 2007

This research note investigates the content, structure, and correlates of the political beliefs of Democratic and Republican local party activists in eleven Southern states. Confirmatory factor analyses reveal that the beliefs of both groups are structured by three factors concerning government involvement in economy and society, traditional values, and women's rights and roles. Regarding the content of belief, Republicans take substantially more con servative positions on several (not all) of the issues organized by the three factors and, unlike Democrats, there is little subgroup diversity in their beliefs concerning government involvement and traditional values issues. The political beliefs of Democrats, but not Republicans, also vary geographically, with Deep South Democrats being significantly more conservative than those in border states.
The Presidential Appointment Process, Task Environment Pressures, and Regional Office Case Processing
Authors: Schmidt Diane E.
Published: January 2007

This research examines the impact of changes in the presidential appoint ment process on case processing in the regional offices of regulatory boards using the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) as a case in point. While controlling for regionally determined factors, this study investigates whether changes in the presidential appointment process influence clien tele strategies and the decision-making routines of regional offices. The results show that changes in the presidential appointment process, group strength, and unemployment differentially influence case-filtering and clientele filing behavior in NLRB regional offices generally, and particularly in those offices where clientele are weak or caseloads are low. Only changes in the presidential appointment process had a significant influ ence on both staff and clientele behavior
The Stability of Congressional Roll-Call Indexes
Authors: Herrera Richard , Epperlein Thomas , Smith Eric R.A.N.
Published: January 2007

This study builds on previous work that has shown congressional roll-call indexes to be both reliable and valid indicators of House members' ideolo gy. Using a longitudinal set of data comprised of Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) ratings, Americans for Conservative Action (ACA) scores, Congressional Quarterly's Conservative Coalition (CC) ratings and Nation al Journal's (NJ) scores, we examine the stability of the indexes using a con firmatory factor model. The results confirm the high level of validity and reliability found previously and provide evidence of an equally high level of stability. Congressional roll-call indexes, though based on a sampling of votes taken in the House of Representatives, perform quite well with regard to these three measurement characteristics.
Public Choice in Education: Markets and the Demand for Quality Education
Authors: Smith Kevin B. , Meier Kenneth J.
Published: January 2007

School choice is an increasingly popular education reform. Proponents of choice argue that market forces can improve education through the mechanism of competition-the schools that best satisfy the demands of parents and students will attract clientele and prosper and those that do not will close. A key assumption of choice theorists is that the engine driv ing an education marketplace will be a demand for a higher quality educa tion. This demand for quality assumption rests heavily on comparisons between public and private schools. This paper empirically tests the demand for quality education assumption and finds it wanting. Supplying a demand for religious services and racial segregation are found to be the more likely outcomes of an education marketplace.
Presidential Vetoes: An Event Count Model
Authors: Shields Todd G. , Chi Huang
Published: January 2007

We argue that past models of presidential veto behavior have not ade quately conceptualized the fundamental nature of the dependent variable—a count of the total number of vetoes per unit of analysis. Conse quently, ordinary least squares techniques have been employed when more appropriate statistical estimation techniques are warranted. Further, past conceptualization (and measurement) of theoretically relevant varia bles have masked important relationships such as the importance of a bi cameral legislature. We show that rigorous consideration of research methodologies provides theoretical insights obscured by relying on more traditional approaches. Finally, this investigation updates understanding of the veto process through the first year of the Clinton administration.
Calling It Quits: Strategic Retirement on the Federal Courts of Appeals, 1893-1991
Authors: Spriggs James F , Wahlbeck Paul J.
Published: January 2007

Does politics influence judicial retirements? Judicial scholars have long ac knowledged the role of politics in the judicial appointment process and in judicial decision making, but the judicial retirement literature presents divergent conclusions on the effect of politics. We employ an event count model to test the influence of politics on the annual number of voluntary departures from the federal courts of appeals from 1893 through 1991. Our data provide evidence that more judges are likely to retire when politi cal conditions favor the selection of successors sharing their policy views or when unfavorable political conditions appear unlikely to change. These political factors are significant even after controlling for the costs incurred by continued service on the courts, such as diminishing salary, increasing caseload, age, and improved retirement benefits.
The State of State Politics Research
Authors: Brace Paul , Jewett Aubrey
Published: January 2007

Reviewers of the state of state politics research often lament the field's lack of theoretical progress and its fragmented character These conditions per sist yet a review of this research published in the professions top journals over the past decade reveals a substantively rich and often methodologi cally sophisticated body of scholarship. Applying an inclusive approach, this essay examines all research published on state politics over the last decade in the profession's six top journals: APSR, AJPS, JOP, PRQ Polity and SSQ. Trends in substantive focus and the findings of this research are described, as are methodological approaches and innovations. The study takes stock of the progress the field has made and identifies promising avenues for future inquiry. The subfield could advance by emphasizing its unique comparative analytical advantages. These advantages provide an excellent opportunity to evaluate the impact of institutional and environ mental contexts on political behavior, processes and outcomes. The field needs to emphasize the importance of modeling political behavior across contexts, and interactively across contextual and individual levels of analy sis. By so doing, the subfield can show how states matter and also assess the generality of models that focus too often on behavior or process within single contexts.
Elections as Filters: Term Limits and the Composition of the U.S. House
Authors: Mondak Jeffery J.
Published: January 2007

Assessment of proposals to limit legislative terms has been restricted, and thus muddled, by a dearth of empirical data. Absent hard evidence, an abundance of often contradictory speculation has emerged, further cloud ing the term limits debate. This paper offers a simple mathematical model in an effort to construct a sound analytic framework for examination of the possible effects of terms limits on the composition of the U.S. House. The model treats elections as filters, or mechanisms with which voters strive to differentiate among candidates on the basis of quality. The analysis demonstrates that term limits will produce a substantial reduction in the quality of the U.S. House under baseline conditions. Terms limits also are associated with a decline in the quality of the House in a majority of alter native conditions, and the average magnitude of that decline is substantial.
Race, Turnout, and Public Policy In the American States
Authors: Radcliff Benjamin , Saiz Martin
Published: January 2007

We attempt to bridge the conceptual gap between the black politics and state politics literatures by studying the effect of racial differences in elec toral participation on public policy. If state politics has considered whether "voters matter," and black politics has asked whether "black elected officials matter," we attempt to determine if "black voters matter." In particular, we ask whether, and how, the racial composition of the electorate affects state policies. Our results suggest that the greater black participation relative to that of whites, the less liberal are state policies. The implications for democratic theory and black politics are discussed.
Property Rights, Democracy and Economic Growth
Authors: Leblang David A.
Published: January 2007

In attempting to identify institutional factors that influence a nation's per capita growth rate, scholarship in political science has focused almost ex clusively on differences in political regimes. This article argues that if we are interested in understanding why some nations grow faster than others, then we must redirect our inquiry and focus on property rights. Using new measures for property rights protection and democracy, and building on an endogenous growth model, this study presents the first approximation of the relationship between property rights, democracy, and economic growth. These relationships are tested using cross-national panel data from 1960-90. The evidence supports two conclusions: (1) economies of na tions that protect property rights grow more rapidly than those of nations that do not protect property rights; and (2) the nature of a political regime influences economic growth indirectly through its commitment to prop erty rights.