Showing papers on "Voting behavior published in 1970"

The effects of precinct-level canvassing on voter behavior

Abstract: How do the millions of hours spent in each election on door-to-door canvassing affect voters' behavior? Data from the SRC election surveys of 1952, 1956, 1960, and 1964 are analyzed by maximum-likelihood methods to estimate the effects of such canvassing. Personal contact is found to be effective in increasing turnout, but not effective in influencing voter preferences for presidential, congressional, or local-office candidates. Repeated contacts are also found to be relatively ineffective. Gerald Kramer is Associate Professor of Political Science, and a staff member of the Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, at Yale.

A Comparative Analysis of Senate-House Voting on Economic and Welfare Policy, 1953–1964

Abstract: The manifest purpose of the roll call analysis described in this paper is that of demonstrating the existence of two policy dimensions in Congressional voting: economic and welfare. Support is sought for two propositions:I. Each of the two dimensions appears in both the House and the Senate in each of six Congresses, the 83rd through the 88th, 1953–1964;II. Roll call voting on the economic policy dimension is more heavily influenced by partisan differences while welfare policy voting is more subject to constituency constraints.The second proposition is significant as an attempt to distinguish between a policy dimension on which partisan differences appear to be responsible for the greater part of the voting variation, and a policy dimension on which constituency factors have a substantial impact. This bears upon the more general concern with distinguishing those party differences in voting behavior which are a function of an independent partisan factor from those which may be attributed to any number of factors correlated with partisan affiliation. This problem will be viewed from different analytic perspectives, including an analysis of the effects of intra-party and inter-party personnel turnover on the policy positions taken by representatives of the same constituency.

The Mistrustful-Efficacious Hypothesis and Political Participation

Abstract: In his recent integration and development of the literature on subjective political efficacy and political trust, Gamson' states an appealing and potentially fruitful hypothesis: among those who are efficacious politically, the politically mistrustful are more likely to participate than are the trusting. In his words, "More specifically, a combination of high sense of political efficacy and low political trust is the optimum combination for mobilization-a belief that influence is both possible and necessary."2 The common-sense case for Gamson's hypothesis is highly plausible. For those who lack a sense of efficacy, trust orientations may be essentially irrelevant: why get involved (regardless of trust) if you believe that your participation will have no effect? It would appear, however, that trust orientations are important for those who feel efficacious. The trustful efficacious are apparently under no particular compunction to participate: why get involved if you are confident that the authorities will make decisions favorable to you without your participation? In the residual category are those persons who feel that they can influence and, in light of the perceived unfavorable bias of the authorities, feel that they must do so in order to guard against possible undesirable political outputs. The hypothesis is of special importance for at least two reasonsits generality and its simplicity. Its simplicity is apparent, for it relies on only two sources of variance to explain political involvement. Equally clear is its generality, since it is unrestricted temporally, spatially, or with respect to type of political participation. The hypothesis was tested in the course of a study of the psychopolitical bases of local political integration-an issue that arose in

Response Set Bias and Political Socialization Research.

Abstract: SINCE would tion deals SO seem MUCH with in OF order the THE "basic to LITERATURE examine political some IN THE orientations" of the FIELD basic OF assumptions POLITICAL of young people,2 SOCIALIZAinherent it SINCE tion deals with the "basic political orientations" of young people,2 it would seem in order to exa ine some of t e b sic as umptions inher in studies which report children's political attitudes. In particular some attention should be focused upon those assumptions which have implications for the validity of this research. The investigation of children's "basic political orientations" has normally taken the form of attitude measurement with standard survey items. Although this is a conventional procedure in social science, it is worthy of reiteration that survey research, like all other methods, is not without certain shortcomings.3 Aside from the many technical kinds of problems involved in this approach, there exists the fundamental problem of the validity4 of all data gathered by the questionnaire technique. That is to say,

Public reaction to political protest: chicago 1968

Abstract: Despite press and television coverage largely sympathetic to antiwar demonstrators who clashed with Chicago police on August 28, 1968, public opinion remained overwhelmingly unsympathetic. Here, John P. Robinson examines two main questions: Who comprised the minority sympathetic to the demonstrators? How did attitudes toward the protesters and the police affect presidential voting behavior in November 1968, particularly among Democrats and Independents, whose voting behavior was most likely to be affected by the events in Chicago? The author is a Study Director at the Survey Research Center and Assistant Professor in the Department of Journalism at the University of Michigan. He is currently on leave as a Research Coordinator at the Surgeon General's Television and Social Behavior Program at the National Institute of Mental Health.

Incumbency and The Presidential Vote in Senate Elections: Defining Parameters of Subpresidential Voting

Abstract: Compared with the recent substantial strides in presidential election analysis, research on congressional elections has only begun. The majority of studies have been cast within the presidential-election context, with the relationship between the presidential and congressional vote the phenomenon to be explained. The present attention to presidential contests is understandable because of the inherent interest in such races in a presidential-centered political system and because reliable survey data have been limited to nationwide samples, severely restricting analysis on a state or district basis. And yet without some comparable advances at the congressional level, we cannot assess bases of electoral support nor the numerous assumptions of behavior in Congress as linked to this support, nor attempt a theory of voting behavior that does not consider voting at the subpresidential level. Put simply, the state of research is such that we have only begun to identify and measure the key variables affecting congressional voting outcomes. It is this basic task to which recent research in the field has been directed. Consider as the core phenomenon for explanation the sharp fluctuations over time in the partisan division of the vote for Senator and Representative. Since studies of voting behavior indicate the stability of party loyalties over time, evidence of sharp shifts in voting outcomes suggest factors other than party cues influencing the vote decision. Among the lines of inquiry opened, studies by Cummings, Press, and Hinckley, following the work of Key, have utilized aggregate election statistics to measure the substantial impact of the presidential vote on House election outcomes.

An Axiomatic Model of Voting Bodies

Abstract: The act of voting in legislative and judicial bodies is one of the most widespread and valuable sources of information available to political analysts. When individuals make structured choices within some known institutional constraints, there is opportunity for the generation of data concerning how issues are collectively defined within an institution, the relative position of each actor with regard to every other actor, and the identification of blocs of actors which are more or less persistent from one issue to another over time. With proper techniques of analysis, we should be able not only to generalize about behavior within a given voting body but also to make general statements about the voting process.Cumulative studies of voting can be undertaken, however, only on the basis of some paradigm of the voting process—that is, some consensus on how voting as an act of political commitment is to be viewed. Such a paradigm not only should provide a viewpoint for the study of voting but should also suggest an orientation to the more general political phenomenon of which voting is an example—that is, actors making mutually exclusive choices in response to a series of questions, issues, candidates, etc. That such an agreed-upon viewpoint—not to mention a model that gives the viewpoint a precise focus—does not exist is obvious from the uses which have been made of voting data. Despite the ubiquity of such data and the many different kinds of analyses that have been performed on them, there is no model available that logically interrelates (1) systemic characteristics of voting bodies, (2) individual characteristics of their members, and (3) relational characteristics between pairs of members in such a way as to yield operational measures of voting behavior that are comparative in nature.

Residential Relocation and Political Behavior: Conceptual Model and Empirical Tests:

Abstract: A conceptual model of the effects of residential relocation of voters upon their voting behavior is elaborated; in this model relocation is related directly to instability of voting preferences, su...

Political Belief Systems and Political Behavior.

Abstract: This way beliefs, paper that political social is addressed scientists behavior, to have several and looked the conceptual way at political that the inadequacies attitudes, interrelationships political in the way that social scientists have looked at political attitudes, political beliefs, political be avior, d t e w y hat e interrelat n h ps between these concepts have been viewed. One set of these difficulties derives from our confusion of civic myth and empirical reality. Present in contemporary American society is the myth of the "informed citizen." The "informed citizen" takes an interest in political matters, thinks about and discusses politics with his neighbors, weighs all sides of all issues, and takes appropriate political action in pursuit of his rational self-interest. Research into the substance of this myth shows slight empirical foundation upon which a conception of the "informed citizen" might rest. Some scholars have reacted to such findings by suggesting that since this assumption of democratic theory is incorrect the theory is in need of revision.1 Other scholars have responded by asserting that we must find ways to make this myth a reality.2 In later studies the problem has been recast in terms of the development of political belief structures in ordinary citizens. Such studies have focused on the ability of citizens to recognize and be informed about public policy questions; and on their ability to see some relationship between a political action that they take (for example, voting) and the political outcome that they wish to achieve. Large numbers of people show by questions on policy issues that they cannot link the policy outcome that they desire with the stands of the public officials that they support. Philip Converse has shown, in a very extensive and competent discussion, that the great mass of people cannot recognize many policy issues, do not have a clear position of their own, cannot link a stand on one policy with stands on other policies, and cannot link their policy stands to appropriate political actions that will help to realize them.3 He finds by a very broad defini-

Additive and Multiplicative Models of the Voting Universe: The Case of Pennsylvania: 1960–1968

Abstract: Of all the fields of political science where quantitative methods have been developed over the past generation, probably the one where scholarly understanding has been most enriched has been that of mass voting behavior. But while we know vastly more about this behavior on the individual and aggregate level than we did a quarter-century ago, there are still large territories on the map which are blank, or in which exploration has only very recently begun. There remain a number of doubtful areas in which issues of methodology and of substantive interpretation are still very much open to systematic inquiry. One such area is that associated with the interrelation of socio-economic correlates of the vote. That is, there is a real question as to whether such independent or predisposing variables should be conceptualized as making mutually independent or, alternatively, interdependent contributions to the prediction of voting patterns. The normal practice in research involving multiple correlation of aggregate voting behavior with a set of independent variables has been to assume implicitly that the relationship of these variables is additive ( i.e. , non-interactive) and that the appropriate theoretical representation is of the general form y = b + m 1 x 1 + m 2 x 2 … + m n x n . Such an assumption seems plausible so far as individual voting for American major parties and their candidates is concerned. Thus, for example, the authors of the MIT 1960 simulation study found strong evidence that predispositional factors summate, i.e. , are indeed additive in character.

Immigrants and Municipal Voting Turnout: Implications for the Changing Ethnic Impact on Urban Politics

Abstract: Turk, Herman 1970 "Interorganizational networks in urban society: Initial perspective and comparative research." American Sociological Review 35 (February):1-19. Ventre, Francis T. 1966 "Local initiatives in urban industrial development." Urban Affairs Quarterly 2 (December) :53-67. Walter, Benjamin 1962 "Political decision making in Arcadia." Pp. 141-187 in F. Stuart Chapin, Jr., and Shirley F. Weiss (eds.), Urban Growth Dynamics. New York: Wiley. Warren, Roland L. 1967a "Interaction of community decision organizations: Some basic concepts and needed research." Social Service Review 41 (September): 261-2 70. 1967b "The interorganizational field as a focus for investigation." Administrative Science Quarterly 12 (December) :396-419. Wilson, James Q. 1966 "Innovation in organization: Notes toward a theory." Pp. 193-218 in James D. Thompson (ed.), Approaches to Organizational Design. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press. Wilson, James Q. and Edward C. Banfield 1964 "Public-regardingness as a value premise in voting behavior." American Political Science Review 58 (December):876-887. 1966 Communication to the editor. American Political Science Review 60 (December): 998-999. Winch, Robert F. and Donald T. Campbell 1969 "Proof? No. Evidence? Yes. The significance of tests of significance." American Sociologist 4 (May):140-143. Wolfinger, Raymond E. and John Osgood Field 1966 "Political ethos and the structure of city government." American Political Science Review 60 (June) :306-326.

Party cohesion and party cooperation in the swedish parliament in 1964 and 1966

Abstract: Summary The Social Democrats displayed a stronger cohesion than the non-Socialist parties; the difference in comparison with the Center party, however, was not significant in 1964. The cohesion of the non-Socialist parties was not significantly different in 1964. In 1966, however, the Conservatives had a stronger cohesion than the middle parties; these two parties did not differ from each other. The Communists had a stronger cohesion than all the other parties. Party cohesion seems to have been intensified from 1964 to 1966. The Communists were, however, an exception; the trend here appears to have been the opposite. On politically important issues, cohesion was subsxantially greater, During divisions on party proposals and government bills the parties closed their ranks. During divisions on a party proposal, members of the party sponsoring the proposal have nearly unanimously supported it. Divisions where sharp splits occurred in a party (2 25 O/o of the votes against the party line), concerned almost invariable issues of minor significance. Of the few exceptions, one or two had some political importance but did not constitute a major issue of political importance. Issues causing sharp splits ≥ 25 % of the votes against the party line) fall within several policy areas. Among such areas with a relatively high frequency are issues concerning culture, education, youth and traffic. With regard to the cohesion of various subgroups, it can be pointed out: The youngest age group (49 years and under) in the different parties often exhibited stronger cohesion than the remaining party members, while, on the contrary, the oldest age group (60 years and over) did not form such cohesive subgroups in the respective parties. Similarly, the MPs with the shortest tenure (those serving their first term) as a rule exhibited a stronger cohesion. On the other hand, MPs with the longest tenure (those serving their fourth term or more) as a rule had a weaker cohesion than the rest of the party. The women MP's cohesion was generally stronger than that of the other members. As far as the Christian group is concerned, the Social Democratic members had a stronger cohesion than the remaining Social Democrats. The picture is more varied for the non-Socialist parties. The Liberal members seem to have been more united, the Conservative and Center party members less united. Members of the temperance groups exhibited only in some instances a stronger cohesion. The analysis of the subgroups' voting behavior across party lines sheds additional light on the findings mentioned above. The youngest age groups and above all the groups with the shortest tenure, in a comparison between the Social Democrats and the non-Socialist parties, generally had a more dissimilar voting behavior than the older groups and groups with longer tenure. The opposite was true for the Liberals-Center party. The voting behavior of women subgroups did not differ from that of the complementary groups. The non-Socialist members of the Christian group had a more similar behavior than the other non-Socialists. As for the Social Democratic members of the Christian group their voting behavior tended to be more dissimilar to that of the non-Socialist members of the group than was the case for the complementary groups. We obtain a similar picture for the temperance groups. The similarity in the voting behavior of the subgroups in the Liberal and Center parties was greater than for the complementary groups. However there was no significant difference for the Soc.—Lib. and Soc.—Cent. 2. Party Cooperation The most frequent two-party- combination of joint voting was Soc. + Com.; the most frequent three-party combination was Cons. + Lib. + Cent. On the other hand, it ought to be stressed that the cases when a strict division between the Socialist and non-Socialist parties occurred constituted a minority of the total number of divisions. If we exclude the Communists, we find that the Social Democrats voted alone during 43% (1964) and 37% (1966) respectively of the divisions, The Liberals and the Center party in toot voted together considerably more times than either did with the Conservatives: 265 times against 214 for the Cons, + Lib. and 193 for the Cons. + Cent. in 1964, and 289 times against 172 for the Cons. + Lib. and 156 for the Cons. + Cent. in 1966. Cooperation between the middle parties increased from 1961 to 1966, while the Conservatives increasingly voted alone. The Liberals were the non-Socialist party- exhibiting the lowest frequency of total joint voting with the Social Democrats, the Center party the highest frequency. The difference between the Liberals and Conservatives, however, is negligible. The Conservatives, relatively more frequently than the middle parties, were the only non-Socialist party to vote in the same way as the Social Democrats. With respect to non-Socialist cooperation during the divisions on non-Socialist party proposals, it can be said: The Conservative party proposals received the support of both the Liberals and the Center parry in about one-fifth of the cases, and in about three-fifths of the cases the Conservatives voted alone; this is true for both years. The Liberal party proposals received the support of the Conservatives in about one-third (1961) and one-half (1966) respectively of the cases and the support of the Center party in about one-half and two-thirds respectively of the cases. The Center party proposals received the support of the Conservatives in about one-half and one-fifth of the cases respectively and the support of the Liberals in about three-fourths and one-half of the cases respectively, The proposals, initiated by the leaders of the middle parties (1966) received the support of the Conservatives during only 8 of the 25 divisions. As far as the government bills are concerned, there is a very high degree of agreement between the percentages of joint voting on the bills and the corresponding figures for the total number of divisions. The comparisons of the scores of indices of likeness reveal the following: The Social Democrats and Conservatives exhibited during both years a more similar voting behavior than the Social Democrats and Liberals. At the same time the Social Democrats and the Center party had a more similar voting behavior than the Social Democrats and Conservatives. Thus the voting behavior of the Liberals differed most from that of the Social Democrats. The Conservatives in 1964 but not in 1966 were significantly more similar to the Liberals than to the Center party in their voting behavior. The analysis of the joint voting of individual MPs discloses that there are some minor groups, as a rule regional groups, in the parties with a high frequency of voting jointly with a corresponding group in another party or with that party in general.

Party Discipline in War-Time: The Downfall of the Chamberlain Government

Abstract: The remarkably high level of unified party-line voting in the British House of Commons is so well known that contrasting behavior has been little studied. Analysis of deviant cases, however, is very likely to further our understanding of legislative behavior that is extraordinary by American, and even European, standards. In what circumstances does party cohesion break down in Britain? What pressures or factors work against voting solidarity? Answering such questions should help explain why the normal pattern of British legislative behavior exhibits such great unity. Despite these considerations, no one has attempted to study thoroughly the most significant deviant case of British Parliamentary voting behavior in the twentieth century-the division of 8 May 1940. The fact that Britain was at war enhances this division as a research site. When even the breath of dissent could be made to appear unpatriotic, the bonds of party unity would seem to be maximized. One of those who was a Member of Parliament at the time termed the vote, in discussing it 25 years later, "the most fateful division in parliamentary history."' For two days the Commons debated the Chamberlain Government's conduct of the Norwegian campaign. Fearful that under the circumstances a direct challenge to Chamberlain might rally even the dissident Conservatives to his defense, the Labour party leaders hesitated to demand

An unobtrusive measure of prejudice toward Negroes under differing durations of speech.

Abstract: This study investigated the relationship between the voting behavior of naive white Ss toward a Negro or white individual in a small group discussion when the Negro or white individual talked more ...

Linear Algebra and Legislative Voting Behavior: Rice's Indices

Abstract: L legislative voting behavior has been extensively researched by behavioral scientists using a variety of quantitative indices and mathematical techniques. Some of these indices and techniques have been used for decades, but their essentially mathematical properties have been subjects of debate or have not been thoroughly explored. Stuart Rice's index of cohesion and index of likeness, for example, have been used continuously since the 1920s but have rarely been investigated from a mathematical point of view.' Despite continuous use since the 1920s, Rice's indices suffer from a well-known flaw, viz., legislators who neither vote aye nor vote nay are omitted. This shortcoming hardly needs elaboration, but two aspects deserve notice. (i) Empirically, the number of omitted legislators may be rather large in relation to the total size of the party or other subset of legislators being studied. An extreme example is furnished by the 1910 British House of Commons. During the session of July 18, on division number 106, the vote was 49 ayes, 1 nay, and approximately 620 MPs did not vote. (There were 670 seats in the House of Commons, but a few were vacant as a result of deaths, resignations, etc.) The low turnout may be amusingly explained by the fact that the division occurred at 3 A.M. in the morning of July 19. During the 1910 Parliament, however,

The 1967 Indian Election: Patterns of Party Regularity and Defection

Abstract: o almost everyone, even scholarly observers in the field, the results of the 1967 Indian national election were startling. Although one could sense that change was in the air, the magnitude and nature of the "upset" was unexpected. The dominance which the Congress Party had maintained for 20 years was broken; key establishment leaders including the party president, Kamaraj, were defeated; non-Congress governments were formed in eight states (governing two-thirds of the Indian population); and the Congress dropped from 73.1% of the seats in the Lok Sahba (lower house of Parliament) to 54.6%a loss of 81 seats. Faced with these sensational developments pundits and scholars alike advanced a spate of theories and explanations of -the election, some carefully reasoned, others less cautious and more speculative. At the level of parliament and government the basic argument has been concerned with whether or not the evidence from the election indicates that Congress government has been repudiated and what the meaning of the election is with respect to the emergence of new leadership, new policy, new power relationships, new legislative party roles. At the level of the electorate the argument has concerned the question of whether a new alignment in voting behavior is occurring, linked to new social and political forces, an alignment which augurs the demise of the one party dominant system, possibly the disintegration of Congress itself, and the rise of stronger non-Congress parties and new party coalitions at the national as well as at the state level. As the Economic and Political Weekly put the question, is this a "deepening political crisis or a passing phase?" As the student of "critical elections" would put it, is this a "realigning" election with a basic shift in party loyalties and voting behavior or only a "deviating" election? It

An Analysis of Institutional Effects: Staffing Legislative Parties in Wisconsin

Abstract: A dominant empirical tendency in political science during the past decades has been the study of individual attitudes and behaviors. Analysis has focused on description of what political actors believe and do and on explanation of why they hold certain views and participate in certain ways. Lately, the currents of the discipline have been shifting, and increasing attention is again being devoted to the nature and effects of political institutions. Among the political institutions undergoing contemporary reexamination are American legislatures. Whereas earlier work explored the role orientations or voting behavior of different categories of legislators,' more recent work treats legislative procedures, leadership, and committees.2 In the field of state politics there is considerable emphasis today on relations between social, economic, and political characteristics on the one hand and policy outcomes on the other.3 Largely as a result of this comparative research, which demonstrates only a negligible association between political factors and policy outcomes, three interrelated assumptions about legislative institutions have arisen. The first is that legis-

Continuity and change in adolescent political party preferences 1

Abstract: IN his discussion of the theoretical implications of political socialization, David Easton concludes that ‘most research, with a few notable exceptions, unobtrusively assumes that in one way or another the outcome of socializing processes is to assure the continuity of a political system in relatively unchanged form.‘z Why should most research have this strong system maintenance bias? Undoubtedly it owes much to the stress which has been placed upon the importance of the family in the socialization process.3 If children think and act like their parents then at least at the level of individual behaviour there is propensity towards continuity. Emphasis upon the preservation of the political system involves the acceptance of a further assumption: that the continuity of individual behaviour results in a stable political system. Thus a democracy or civic culture requires democratic citizens even if one now thinks in terms of group rather than individual characteristics.4 The prevalent topic in political socialization research has been an examination of how the individual acquires his political party preference.5 Furthermore, the central importance of the family in the inter-generational transfer of political loyalties has become part of the conventional wisdom of political science. Most of the supporting evidence stems from comparisons of the voting behaviour of parents and their children. In the well-known Elmira study. Bernard Berelson revealed that 75 per cent of the first participants elected to vote for the political party of their fathers.6 More recently, David Butler and Donald Stokes concluded: ‘But it is the direction of the child‘s partisanship that is the foremost legacy of the early years. A child is very likely to share his parent’s party preference. Partisanship over the individual’s life time has some of the quality of a photographic reproduction that deteriorates with time: it is a fairly sharp copy of