Showing papers on "Voting behavior published in 1992"

The Reasoning Voter: Communication and Persuasion in Presidential Campaigns

Abstract: "The Reasoning Voter" is an insider's look at campaigns, candidates, media, and voters that convincingly argues that voters make informed logical choices. Samuel L. Popkin analyzes three primary campaigns Carter in 1976; Bush and Reagan in 1980; and Hart, Mondale, and Jackson in 1984 to arrive at a new model of the way voters sort through commercials and sound bites to choose a candidate. Drawing on insights from economics and cognitive psychology, he convincingly demonstrates that, as trivial as campaigns often appear, they provide voters with a surprising amount of information on a candidate's views and skills. For all their shortcomings, campaigns "do" matter. "If you're preparing to run a presidential campaign, and only have time to read one book, make sure to read Sam Popkin's "The Reasoning Voter." If you have time to read two books, read "The Reasoning Voter" twice." James Carville, Senior Stategist, Clinton/Gore '92 "A fresh and subtle analysis of voter behavior." Thomas Byrne Edsall, "New York Review of Books""Professor Popkin has brought V.O. Key's contention that voters are rational into the media age. This book is a useful rebuttal to the cynical view that politics is a wholly contrived business, in which unscrupulous operatives manipulate the emotions of distrustful but gullible citizens. The reality, he shows, is both more complex and more hopeful than that." David S. Broder, "The Washington Post""

Voters as Fiscal Conservatives

Abstract: Voters penalize federal and state spending growth. This is the central result of my analysis of voting behavior in Presidential, Senatorial, and gubernatorial elections from 1950–1988. The composition of federal spending growth seems irrelevant. The vote loss to the President's party from an extra dollar of defense or nondefense spending is the same. However, in gubernatorial elections, expansion of state welfare spending exacts a disproportionate political price. Deficit financing of federal or state spending does not appear to matter politically. I conclude by discussing the obvious question of why government budgets have grown in the face of this voter hostility.

The Myth of the Independent Voter

Abstract: Few events in American politics over the past two decades have generated more attention than the increasing number of voters calling themselves Independent. By the early 1970s Independents outnumbered Republicans, according to many eminent experts on voting behavior. Yet the authors of this incisive new commentary on American politics claim that most of this widespread speculation on declining party affiliation is simply wrong. They contend that most so-called Independents lean strongly toward one of the two parties and resemble - in all important respects - either Democrats or Republicans. Contrary to expert opinion, only a small segment of voters are truly 'independent' of either major party. Based on the most up-to-date 1990 data, "The Myth of the Independent Voter" provides a road map of the political arena for the general reader and scholar alike. Debunking conventional wisdom about voting patterns and allaying recent concerns about electoral stability and possible third party movements, the authors uncover faulty polling practices that have resulted in a skewed sense of the American voting population. Demonstrating that most of what has been written about Independents for more than thirty years is myth, this challenging book offers a trenchant new understanding of the party system, voting behavior, and public opinion.

A Hero for the Aged? The Townsend Movement, the Political Mediation Model, and U.S. Old-Age Policy, 1934-1950.

Abstract: During the Depression, the Townsend movement enjoyed varied success in seeking pensions for the aged. Social-movement models predict that success depends on the mobilization of resources or on collective action. Other theories predict that economic or political conditions cause the emergence of movements and changes in public spending. The political mediation model used here holds that, to succeed, a movement must reinforce political action with strong organization of members under favorable political conditions. This article defines "success" and employs various analytical and empirical strategies, including qualitative comparative analysis on state level data, to appraise the models. Although each perspective has some support, the political mediation model offers the best explanation of the patterns of successes. The state and the political party system determine whether mobilization and action benefit a constituency and win acceptance for a movement organization.

Are Contributors Rational? Untangling Strategies of Political Action Committees

Abstract: Empirical public choice literature and casual observation suggest that the behavior of political action committees is remarkably unsophisticated, meaning that PACs give to those legislators who would support their interests anyway. Thus it is suggested that contributor behavior deviates from rational behavior, which is a cornerstone of economic analysis. In this paper, a switching regression model is estimated that allows for strategies of PACs to vary for different contribution recipients. I analyze the behavior of farm PACs over three election cycles. In contrast to previous findings, I find that contributor behavior is not inconsistent with rational behavior. Contributors who attempt to influence the voting behavior of members of Congress give the most money to legislators whose constituency interest suggests that they are likely to be undecided on how to vote and PACs give less money to legislators who represent districts with larger farm populations because those legislators are likely to vote in con...

Citizens and Community: Political Support in a Representative Democracy

Abstract: List of tables and figures Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The problem of political support 2. Economy, society, self 3. Democracy, political system, self 4. Political support and its correlates 5. Regional disaffection: Quebec and the West 6. Elections and political support 7. Causes and consequences of political support 8. Political support in representative democracies Appendix References Index.

The Effects of Logrolling on Congressional Voting

Abstract: The theoretical public-choice literature suggests that vote trading is an important determinant of congressional voting behavior. Yet empirical voting models do not allow for vote trading. These models recognize that observed ideology may influence legislative behavior but do not correct for unobserved ideology. This study devises new tests for logrolling and ideology. The empirical model controls for logroll agreements and unobserved ideological interest via the correlation of unobserved variables. The results reflect the presence of vote-trading coalitions on some votes but not on others. The results cast doubt on the importance of personal ideological interests of legislators. Copyright 1992 by American Economic Association.

Toward an Integrated Model of Judicial Voting Behavior

Abstract: This article is an initial step toward the development of an integrated model of judicial decision making. The study synthesizes elements derived from contextual and attitudinal perspectives by app...

Reliable and unreliable partisan appointees to the Board of Governors

Abstract: Every new appointment to the Board of Governors in recent years has triggered speculation as to how the new Governor will vote in FOMC meetings. While several studies have hinted at partisan voting behavior by Governors, no study has yet attempted to identify reliable and unreliable partisan voting behavior and to pinpoint the background characteristics of Governors that distinguish between the two. This paper indicates that Board members with a background in economics consistently voted in line with the economic ideology of the appointing President. Noneconomists on the Board, however, displayed no such partisan voting behavior and were seen to be influenced by pressures emanating from the Administration and by the monetary environment prior to their appointment. Over the 1951 to 1987 period, most Presidents have appointed reliable Governors earlier in their Presidential terms (when the returns from being able to influence subsequent monetary policy are great) and have chosen unreliable Governors later in their terms (when election support from the interest groups that these unreliables represent is important). The results of the present paper suggest skepticism toward the recent spate of rational expectations — game-theoretic models which feature a dictatorial policy maker gaming atomistic market participants whose only political activity, voting, generates monetary surprises followed by convergence to an equilibrium. Because of their obsession with the ceremonial formalism of their genre, these models ignore a vast complementary literature and, as a consequence, display conspicuously flimsy institutional and historical premises. Instead, the present paper argues for the greater relevance of models of uncoordinated interaction between multiple political and private principals and Federal Reserve agents.

Membership Change and Collective Voting Change in the United States Supreme Court

Abstract: Scholars and other observers of the Supreme Court generally perceive that change in the Court's membership is the primary source of change in its policies and decisional patterns. This article is an effort to test that perception by examining the sources of collective voting change in civil liberties decisions during the 1946-1985 terms of the Court. Focusing on periods of significant change in collective voting behavior during this era, the analysis shows that membership change was the primary source of voting change overall but that change in the voting behavior of continuing members played a major role in producing collective voting change during some periods.

Courting Constituents? An Analysis of the Senate Confirmation Vote on Justice Clarence Thomas

Abstract: The increasing public attention paid to Supreme Court nominations has elevated the salience of Senate confirmation battles, raising interesting questions about the impact of constituency preferences on senators' voting behavior. In this article, we explore this relationship using a logistical regression model to examine the impacts of African-American constituency size and the proximity of reelection on the roll call behavior of senators on the Clarence Thomas confirmation vote. Our analyses indicate that these factors were both statistically and substantively significant in the Thomas case. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and practical implications of such findings.

Global Structures and Political Processes in the Study of Domestic Political Conflict

Abstract: The comparative study of domestic political conflict has experienced a paradigm shift with the replacement of theories emphasizing deprivation and system imbalance with theories of the political and structural sources of protest and rebellion. This review summarizes criticisms of the earlier theories, arguing that these have been subsumed by newer theories that focus on the relationships between political processes, the state, the capitalist world economy, the inter-state system and the origins and dynamics of social protest and political rebellion. We outline two useful approaches: a political process theory that emphasizes the impact of internal political institutions and processes, such as political exclusion, indigenous organization, and political opportunity structures; and theories of global structures that focus on the external or international processes of incorporation into the capitalist world economy, the social effects of foreign capital penetration, and political dependence on core states. Fi...

Challenger Quality and Voting Behavior in U. S. Senate Elections

Abstract: A number of aggregate-level studies find that challenger quality is an important variable in explaining congressional election outcomes. Using the National Election Studies' 1988 Senate Election Study, I provide individual-level evidence supporting this claim. I develop and test measures of two aspects of challenger quality, one based on political experience and the other on campaign skills. Senate challengers who hold higher profile offices and those who are good campaigners are better known and better liked by voters and are much more likely to get votes, even with partisanship and campaign spending controlled. The findings reaffirm that candidates and campaigns matter in explaining election outcomes.

The effect of enduring, situational, and response involvement on preference stability in the context of voting behavior

Abstract: A conceptual model of the relationships between enduring, situational, and response involvement is proposed and tested in the context of decision-making associated with a political election. Specifically, the model concerns relationships between involvement, knowledge, confidence, and the stability of preference for a specific candidate over time. Empirical support for the proposed model is found, and implications for involvement researchers and political marketers are offered.

Predicting Voting Behavior via the Agenda-Setting Tradition

Abstract: The agenda-setting function has primarily reinforced the premise that the mass media do not tell people what to think, but what to think about. The possibility that the agenda-setting function may exist in a two-step process is explored, from the transfer of salience to behavioral outcome. The results of a two-group discriminant analysis appear to indicate that specific groups of voters can be identified according to their level of issue concerns. The study suggests that the mass media may not only tell us what to think about, but they influence what actions we take regarding those thoughts.

Decoding television news: The political discourse of Israeli hawks and doves

Abstract: Present-day Israel is a one-issue country. In regard to the Israeli-Arab conflict, its population is divided between hard-liners on the right those who will not yield occupied territories in exchange for peace and those more inclined to compromise. Members of the young generation are politically more hawkish than their parents.' This move to the right can be seen in voting behavior, but even more significantly it is evident in the rise of hatred of Arabs and the recent emergence of population "transfer" as an acceptable solution. In a study analyzing this trend from the perspective of political socialization that takes place within families, we find that whereas all parents have a better than random chance to reproduce their political outlook in their adolescent children, hawks are more successful than doves.2

The effects of political participation on political efficacy: A simultaneous equations model

Abstract: The absence of studies investigating the influence of political participation on individuals’ perceptions of political efficacy constitutes a significant gap in our knowledge of political behaviour. While many researchers have investigated the influence of efficacy on political participation, and there has been some endeavour to examine the reciprocity of the relationship between the variables, none has estimated a comprehensive model of the impact of individuals’ participation is different kinds of political activity on different aspects of their perceptions of political efficacy. We redress these particular deficiencies in our knowledge of political behaviour, investigating the influence of participation in three different modes of activity—partisan activism, community activism and political extremism—on individuals’ perceptions of internal and external efficacy; that is, their perceptions of political self‐competence and system responsiveness. Our findings confirm that the relationships between differe...

The Contribution of Family Culture to Political Participation, Political Outlook, and Its Reproduction

Abstract: In a secondary analysis of data from a study of political socialization among Israeli teenagers, this article employs a modified and abbreviated version of Chaffee and McLeod's typology of family communications (FCP) to examine its relationship to political participation, political outlook, and the “reproduction” of parents' political outlook in their children. The findings confirm that the pluralist family is most likely to induce political participation, measured by media exposure, political knowledge, and conversation. Family communication pattern was also found to be associated with political outlook, measured in terms of hawkish-dovish orientations to the Arab-Israeli conflict, with a disproportionate number of dovish parents and children in the pluralist families. Nevertheless, the rate of reproduction of specific outlook does not vary significantly among the four types of family communication patterns, except for a suggestion in the data that families have a better chance of reproducing doves when ...

Directional and Euclidean Theories of Voting Behavior: A Legislative Comparison

Abstract: Recent research by Rabinowitz and Macdonald (1989) claims that voting behavior is better accounted for by a directional model than by a traditional proximity or Euclidean model. This paper compares directional and Euclidean models using congressional roll-call voting data. For these relatively well-informed voters, we can unambiguously reject the directional model in favor of the traditional Euclidean spatial model. We conclude that congressional voting can indeed be very accurately represented by the Euclidean model.

Lower Class Insurgency and the Political Process: The Response of the U.S. Unemployed, 1890- 1940

Abstract: This paper examines the level of protest activity by the unemployed in the United States between 1890 and 1940 as a test of the value of a political process model for explaining social movement activity. Data on protest events and elite attitudes towards the unemployed were collected from newspaper articles. Voting behavior was used as an indicator of contested elections and unemployment levels were reflected by available indicators. Consistent with previous research on lower- and working-class mobilization, a change in the political environment was key to the extensive protest by the unemployed in the 1930s. Toward the end of the 1920s, and especially in the early 1930s, elites were no longer simply making public statements about the problem of unemployment, but were also discussing the need for aid programs. In the context of this new political environment, elections were once again contested in the 1930s, and extensive protest began in 1930, even before unemployment hit its high point in 1933. Thus, it was not simply deprivation, but the changed political environment which legitimized the issue of unemployment and created prospects for reform, which in turn helped produce the massive protest of the 1930s.

Cognitive Strategies and Candidate Evaluations

Abstract: Decades of voting behavior studies have found party affiliation, issue stands and ideology, and candidate image to be major factors influencing voter evaluations of candidates. The relative importa...

The Impact of Economic Conditions On the Voting Behavior of Blacks

Abstract: 1989: Table 746; see also Oliver and Shapiro 1989) and a median family income $14,000 more than blacks (Statistical Abstract, 1990: Table 720). The relatively low income and asset level in the black community might encourage attention to economic perceptions, especially egocentric and group-based ones. Some supporting evidence for this general idea was found by Alford (1982) who showed that the more prosperous the aggregate economic conditions, the less voters will be influenced by individual egocentric financial perceptions. The logic here is that when the economy slumps, it is easy to blame personal economic troubles on the government; when the economy booms, it is much more difficult to blame personal troubles entirely on the government. Blacks, many of whom are part of a more marginal economy than most whites, might be inclined to use economic

Older Voters and the 1992 Presidential Election

Abstract: At the core of the so-called "generational equity" construct is the notion that older persons exercise self-interested political power. This article examines what we know about one element of the politics of aging--the voting behavior of older persons in recent presidential elections--and suggests areas of research on the 1992 election that may tell us something about how far, and how soon, proponents of generational equity will be able to move toward dismantling policies that benefit older people.

Social Psychology of Political and Economic Cognition

Abstract: Value Systems and Political Cognition. The Dissolution of the Right in the Wake of Theory. Predicting Political Party Identification in New Voters. Political Party Identification in New Voters. Political Intolerance and Youth Centrism in Adolescence. Soviet Youth in Perestroika, Political Attitudes and Participation. Fairy Tales and Other Literature as Instruments in Young Children's Economic Socialization. S.E.G. Lea, Assessing the Psychology of Economic Behaviour and Cognition Index.

The electoral consequences of north-south migration.

Abstract: The authors examine the impact of internal migration in Great Britain on voting behavior. "Analysis of the British Election Studies suggests that migration between the north and south of Britain does have political effects southerly migration leading voters away from Labour and northerly migration towards Labour. This pattern persists even after controls for prior social and political characteristics experience of social mobility and changes in local political environment....The results support the hypothesis that the north-south divide constitutes a distinct new political cleavage distinct from social class and the other more familiar social bases of voting behaviour." (EXCERPT)

The possibility of community-wide flood control benefits: Evidence from voting behavior in a bond referendum

Abstract: Voting behavior in a flood control referendum in Roanoke, Virginia, provides evidence that people living and working outside the flood prone area are willing to pay for flood control project construction. This voting behavior supports the argument that flood control benefits exist at the community level. In providing the cost sharing required under recent federal legislation, local government financing which distributes project costs over the whole population of a local jurisdiction, and not just those persons living or working in protected areas, may increase both economic efficiency and expand communities' financial capacity to pay for such projects.

The politics of the dept crisis in Mexico (1982-1988)

Abstract: There have been numerous studies of the debt crisis from global, Latin American and even Mexican perspectives. However, very few studies have so far addressed the political dimension of the crisis and examined the effects of the crisis on political stability and democratic practice in Mexico. This research focuses on the political dimension of the crisis, in order to make good this important omission in the existing literature. This thesis explores in particular two closely related questions about the practice of politics in Mexico. First, it explores the role which political debates and political pressures have played in shaping the response of the Mexican state to one of the gravest crises faced by the country. Second, it illuminates the common political practice of the Mexican state. This work analyses the political forces involved in the domestic debate surrounding the negotiations between the Mexican state and the IMF during this crisis. It interprets the various economic and political pressures that different Mexican social groups exercised upon the Mexican state. The social actors taken into account in this study are people involved in the political arena such as politicians, bureaucrats and senior members of the state; institutions with socio-economic interests inside civil society such as workers' unions, chambers of private organizations, banks, peasants' organizations, the church, the press and civil associations. The thesis demonstrates how public opinion generated a new political debate through the media. This political debate inside Mexican society was substantially extended and intensified, stimulating the formation of new political alternatives. The awakening of a political consciousness contributed to the generation of an important debate which shaped the contest of the presidential political campaign in 1988. A new political coalition, the FDN, emerged, presenting a serious alternative presidential candidate. In the end, the governing PRI won the presidential elections; nevertheless, many Mexicans gave their support to both the left-wing FDN and the right-wing PAN, instead of to the PRI. Thus, the economic debt crisis culminated in a political electoral crisis during the 1988 presidential elections. To sum up, the thesis proves that the debt crisis as an issue opened up the political debate and led to a political crisis. The earlier process of political reform initiated in Mexico in 1977 opened the space for alternative political parties and views. The debt crisis was taken up as an issue by these alternative groups which encouraged the debate. The debt crisis itself thus reinforced the process of political transformation.