Showing papers on "Voting behavior published in 2001"

Political Knowledge, Political Engagement, and Civic Education

Abstract: After decades of neglect, civic education is back on the agenda of political science in the United States. Despite huge increases in the formal educational attainment of the US population during the past 50 years, levels of political knowledge have barely budged. Today's college graduates know no more about politics than did high school graduates in 1950. Recent research indicates that levels of political knowledge affect the acceptance of democratic principles, attitudes toward specific issues, and political participation. There is evidence that political participation is in part a positional good and is shaped by relative as well as absolute levels of educational attainment. Contrary to findings from 30 years ago, recent research suggests that traditional classroom-based civic education can significantly raise political knowledge. Service learning—a combination of community-based civic experience and systematic classroom reflection on that experience—is a promising innovation, but program evaluations ha...

Political Sophistication and Economic Voting in the American Electorate: A Theory of Heterogeneous Attribution

Abstract: This article presents a theory of heterogeneous attribution, in which an individual's ability to make causal associations depends on his level of political sophistication. Specifically, we maintain that political sophistication dramatically influences the relative importance of personal and national economic judgments in shaping presidential candidate preference. Pocketbook voting, we argue, should be common only among relatively sophisticated voters, who are able to make the associative linkage between changes in their personal financial status and governmental policy. Additionally, we hypothesize that sociotropic evaluations should be most influential for less sophisticated voters. Low sophisticates, we argue, will tend to assume that the national economy is entirely in the President's hands (and vote accordingly), whereas more sophisticated voters understand that the economy is affected by many actors and conditions that are largely beyond the President's control. Testing our theory using data from 1992, 1996, and 1998, we find strong support for our hypotheses. T here is little doubt that changing economic conditions profoundly influence voters' electoral decisions. Since the work of Kramer (1971), a large body of research has accumulated indicating that electoral results at both the state and national levels are driven at least partly by economic fluctuations (Tufte 1975; Hibbs, Rivers, and Vasilatos 1982; Chappell and Keech 1988). There is, however, less consensus on how individual voters, many of whom "have only the fuzziest of notions about many aspects of politics and government," (Markus 1988, 137), evaluate the economic information they receive and connect it to the political world. Do voters assess political candidates based on their personal economic well being (the "pocketbook" voting hypothesis), or on the perceived health of the national economy (the "sociotropic" voting hypothesis)? The answer depends centrally on how voters attribute causal responsibility for changes in both personal and national economic conditions, a process that, we argue, is strongly influenced by the voter's level of political sophistication. In this research, we explicitly incorporate political sophistication into the model of economic voting. For years, researchers have debated the degree of sophistication that voters bring to bear when making politically relevant evaluations (Suzuki 1991; Mackuen, Erikson, and Stimson 1992). At the macro-level, the debate has hinged largely on the difference between voter evaluations based on retrospective assessments and those guided by more "sophisticated" prospective economic forecasts. This dichotomy is typified by Mackuen, Erikson, and Stimson's (1992) distinction between retrospective voters, or cognitive "peasants," and prospective voters, or cognitive "bankers." Micro-level theorists have also noted the importance of

Immigrant Incorporation and Political Participation in the United States.

Abstract: This article examines several factors related to immigrant incorporation that have been ignored in previous studies of voting participation. We add various immigrant-related variables to a model th...

Decisions and elections: Explaining the unexpected.

Abstract: 1. Do we get what we expect 2. Arrow's theorem 3. Explanations and examples 4. What else can go wrong? 5. More perversities 6. A search for resolutions 7. From Sen to prisoners and prostitution 8. Glossary, notes, and technical talk.

Developing Valid Knowledge Scales

Abstract: central variables in research on mass political behavior, but insufficient attention has been given to the implications of alternate approaches to the measurement of political knowledge. Two issues are considered here: (1) survey protocol regarding "don't know" responses and (2) item format. Data from the 1998 NES Pilot and a survey conducted in the Tallahassee metropolitan area are used to assess alternate survey protocols. or decades, students of mass politics have assessed how much citizens know about politics, how people acquire and process political information, whether political behavior varies as a function of differences in knowledge levels, and whether various psychological mechanisms enable deficiencies in political knowledge to be overcome. Virtually all research on public opinion, voting behavior, and media effects confronts one or more of these questions. Because of the importance of knowledge as an analytical construct, several authors have explored issues in the measurement of political knowledge. This research has produced compelling evidence that political awareness is best represented with data from survey batteries that measure factual political knowledge. Less insight has emerged, however, regarding the implications of how those knowledge batteries are constructed. Therefore, my purposes in this article are to identify some of the key issues in the construction of knowledge batteries and to demonstrate the consequences associated with use of alternate measurement procedures. Two issues in the measurement of political knowledge are addressed: (1) survey protocol regarding "don't know" responses and (2) item format. For both, possible changes in measurement procedures are discussed. Following this discussion, several potential liabilities associated with use of new procedures are considered. In the last section of this article, I demonstrate how the choice of knowledge measures affects hypothesis testing. Throughout this article, alternate measurement procedures are evaluated using data from two split-ballot surveys, the 1998 NES Pilot, and a survey conducted in late 1998 and early 1999 in the Tallahassee metropolitan area.

The Effects of Party and Preferences on Congressional Roll Call Voting

Abstract: We assess the importance of parties in Congress by comparing roll-call voting behavior against the preferences of members of the House as expressed in surveys conducted during the 1996 and 1998 elections. The surveys were conducted by Project Vote Smart. Our findings support two key conclusions. First, both party and preferences mattered in predicting roll-call behavior in the 103d, 104th, and 105th Congresses. Second, the independent effects of party were present in only about 40% of roll calls. The incidence of party effects was highest on close votes, procedural votes, and key "party" issues. It was lowest on matters of conscience, such as abortion, and "off-the-first-dimension" issues, such as affirmative action and gun control.

Values, Communication Behavior, and Political Participation

Abstract: This article examines how communication patterns mediate the influences of values on political participation. We find that the positive effects of postmaterial values on participation are mediated ...

A Panel Probit Analysis of Campaign Contributions and Roll-Call Votes

Abstract: Despite numerous analyses of the relationship between campaign contributions and the roll-call voting behavior of members of Congress, we still lack definitive answers to longstanding questions about whether contributions affect votes. Part of the reason for this is that it is methodologically difficult to account for members' predispositions to vote in favor of PACs' interests. This article seeks to advance our understanding of the relationship between campaign contributions and voting behavior by using a method for panel data that overcomes the problem of accounting for voting predispositions. This method enables us to account for individual specific effects, such as the predisposition to vote for or against a particular piece of legislation, which are too costly or impossible to measure. Applying this method, I find that contributions do not have consistent effects that would indicate that PACs are significantly biasing congressional decision making in their favor. he influence of "special interests" in politics is a perennial concern of those who seek to reform the political system in the United States. One way that special interests are perceived to have an undue influence is through campaign contributions. Efforts to reform campaign finance laws have been motivated in part by the belief that campaign contributions have a pernicious effect on the behavior of politicians. A recent Gallup survey found that 53 percent of individuals thought that campaign contributions influenced the policies supported by elected officials "a great deal" and 76 percent and 81 percent favored placing limits on contributions from labor and business groups, respectively (Saad 1997). Researchers have devoted a substantial amount of effort and resources to systematic analysis of campaign finance in order to uncover the relationship between campaign contributions and political decision making. One of the key questions that researchers have asked is "Do campaign contributions by political action committees (PACs) influence the roll-call voting behavior of members of Congress?" Despite numerous published analyses of contributions and votes, this question remains unsettled because of the conflicting answers that these analyses have produced.' Some studies have found no relationship between votes and contributions, while others have found the kind of relationship that reformers worry about. Part of the reason for these mixed results is that methodological problems have hampered attempts to assess accurately the degree to which PAC contributions affect voting. One of the most vexing problems is that it is difficult to untangle the effect of contributions from the effect of a member's predisposition to vote one way or another. That is, PACs contribute to members of Congress who are likely to vote the way the PACs favor even in the absence of contributions. A PAC donation to a friendly member might be misconstrued as

The Electoral Advantage to Incumbency and Voters' Valuation of Politicians' Experience: A Regression Discontinuity Analysis of Elections to the U.S...

Abstract: Using data on elections to the United States House of Representatives (1946-1998), this paper exploits a quasi-experiment generated by the electoral system in order to determine if political incumbency provides an electoral advantage - an implicit first-order prediction of principal-agent theories of politician and voter behavior. Candidates who just barely won an election (barely became the incumbent) are likely to be ex ante comparable in all other ways to candidates who barely lost, and so their differential electoral outcomes in the next election should represent a true incumbency advantage. The regression discontinuity analysis provides striking evidence that incumbency has a significant causal effect of raising the probability of subsequent electoral success - by about 0.40 to 0.45. Simulations - using estimates from a structural model of individual voting behavior - imply that about two-thirds of the apparent electoral success of incumbents can be attributed to voters' valuation of politicians' experience. The quasi-experimental analysis also suggest that heuristic 'fixed effects' and 'instrumental variable' modeling approaches would have led to misleading inferences in this context.

Individual Motivations, Perceived Media Importance, and Political Disaffection

Abstract: Mass media have been blamed for distancing people from the political process by increasing cynicism and voter apathy. A telephone survey of 592 registered voters in Washington state tested a set of relationships among political involvement, perceived media importance, political disaffection, and efficacy. As hypothesized, political involvement was positively associated with the perceived importance of newspapers and radio talk shows. These, in turn, were negatively associated with cynicism and positively associated with efficacy. Cynicism was negatively associated with efficacy, while efficacy was positively associated with involvement. The results suggest that involvement is a key variable in the political decision making process through its relationships with orientations toward information sources. Thus, media can serve as a catalyst for involved citizen decision making. Scholars should attend to the motivational context individuals bring to the media when examining the role of the media in political d...

There is More than One Way to Do Political Science: on Different Ways to Study Policy Networks

Abstract: Our recent article in this journal has provoked a series of responses to which we reply here. However, these responses are very different in tone and content and this is reflected in the balance of this reply. Dowding attacks our work in the context of a claim that, essentially, there is only one way to do social science. This critique is so fundamental that it is the focus of the first section of this reply. In contrast, Raab is mainly concerned to argue that he and McPherson cannot be classified as taking an anthropological approach to networks; indeed, he claims that their work adopts a position which has similarities with our own. Finally, Evans attempts to build upon our article, using the work of Benson, to develop what he regards as a more adequate dialectical approach. We shall deal with both of these contributions in the second section of this reply, in which we consider Dowding’s more specific criticisms of our work.

Dealing with Diversity: Racial/Ethnic Context and Social Policy Change

Abstract: We propose and provide an explanation of voting behavior that argues it is a convergence of a social context (high racial/ethnic diversity) and institutional context (frequent use of direct democracy) that is associated with the adoption of public policies targeted at minority groups. We examine this argument in the state of California, the most racially diverse state in the nation, and one that has historically high usage of ballot initiatives. We analyze white voting for four social policy ballot initiatives that directly targeted minority groups over a twelve-year period. Using King's method of ecological inference (1997), the study demonstrates that white support for the initiatives varied systematically by racial and ethnic environments across policy issues and over time. The white votes was consistently higher in “bifurcated” environments, as might be expected given Key's (1949) research on a racial threat; but is was also notably higher in “homogeneous” contexts, even after accounting for economic ...

Attention to Counter-Attitudinal Messages in a State Election Campaign

Abstract: Research following the "selective exposure" model has focused on avoidance of political messages with which a person might disagree. But positive attention to such "counter-attitudinal" messages is worthy of study, in part because normative theories of democracy value exposure to information that might disturb citizens' political predispositions. Surveys of youth (N = 417) and parents (N = 430) examine attention to newspaper, television, and Web messages about candidates. While there is somewhat more attention to messages about and for a person's favored political candidate or party, forms of political involvement (knowledge, curiosity, and discussion) that predict this "attitude-consistent" attention also predict counter-attitudinal attention at least as strongly. Parents' education and students' exposure to civics lessons also predict both kinds of attention. These results suggest that attention to counterattitudinal political messages is worthy of further study as an important goal of political sociali...

Better the Devil You Know Than the Saint You Don't? Risk Propensity and Vote Choice in Mexico

Abstract: This paper argues that personal attitudes toward risk influence vote choice in Mexico. Great uncertainty over the political stances and capabilities of the opposition parties makes risk propensity a key determinant of vote choice. Not all voters who are disenchanted with the status quo take a chance on the less known opposition; risk acceptant voters gamble on these parties, whereas risk averse individuals stick with the "devil they know." Using data from a 1997 national survey and multinomial probit analysis, we show that attitudes toward risk influence voting behavior in Mexico in two ways. First, risk has a direct impact on vote choice. Risk acceptant individuals are more likely, in general, to support the opposition. Second, risk affects vote choice indirectly by conditioning the importance of economic assessments. Risk acceptant individuals are willing to punish negative economic performance, whereas similar, but risk averse, individuals are not.

Political Participation of the Urban Poor

Abstract: Although exploring the political participation of the poor is of paramount significance in the current social policy and welfare environment, the dearth of quantitative, in-depth analysis speaks to the difficulty of conducting research revolving around the political participation of impoverished citizens. In an attempt to gain a fuller understanding of political participation among the urban poor, we investigated variations in economic hardship, political attitudes, and interactions with government agents of a sample of 462 low-income men and women in one of the poorest congressional districts in the country. By working from a theoretical perspective that allowed us to understand better how urban poverty affects the willingness to participate in the political system, we uncovered important nuances and differences in factors that affected political behavior among citizens living in poverty. Our data revealed two central findings: First, material resources and the demographic attributes usually associated with a propensity to participate politically drove political activism even among urban poor respondents. Second, and more importantly, severe economic hardship, as well as formative contact with government agents whom citizens living in urban poverty routinely face, served as significant experiences that bolstered the willingness to participate in the political system. Ultimately, we conclude that the decision to participate in the political system cannot be divorced from the very specific manner in which citizens encounter government.

Impacting the Political Landscape: Who Registers and Votes Among Naturalized Americans?

Abstract: Little is known about the voting behavior of naturalized Americans, primarily due to a lack of good quality data on the national level Using data from the Voting and Registration Supplement to the November 1996 Current Population Survey (CPS), we examine whether region of origin and length of time spent in the United States affect the likelihood of registering and voting among naturalized citizens, net of other socioeconomic and demographic factors already known to influence electoral behavior We find that naturalized citizens who have a longer length of time at current residence and in the United States, and those who are older, with more education and higher income are more likely to register and vote Region of origin is not a major explanatory variable, but there are differences in registering and voting by country of origin among naturalized citizens from Asia and Latin America Finally, being registered is a necessary but not sufficient condition that predicts voting among naturalized citizens from Asia and from Latin America

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE AND THE POLITICAL PROCESS: Movements, Corporations, and the State

Abstract: I explore two questions in this article : (1) How has the role of the U.S. state in the political process changed vis-a-vis corporations ? (2) What tactical repertoires have movements devised to confront this changing political process ? Through the lens of the U.S. environmental movement, I find that (1) the state's policy-making authority has weakened as corporations have become both policy makers and the new targets of challengers, (2) the environmental movement has devised organizing strategies-such as corporate-community compacts or good neighbor agreements-to respond to and influence this new political process, and (3) those segments of the movement that ignore the political economic process are likely to meet with failure. These changes in the political economy constitute a challenge for the political process model. I therefore propose a political economic process perspective to extend the political process model and more accurately capture these dynamics. The political economic process perspective evaluates four state-centric assumptions of the political process model (the state as the primary movement target or vehicle of reform, the state policy-making monopoly, capital as just another interest group, and the primacy of the nation-state level of analysis) and demonstrates that the political economic process has changed in dramatic ways

Voting Preferences and the Environment in the American Electorate

Abstract: Despite evidence of a growing environmental consensus in the United States, students of electoral politics have long debated the political significance of environmentalism by noting the near absence of this issue from national political campaigns. Unfortunately, with only limited survey data available in the past, the few studies to address environmental voting did more to report a deficiency than to explain why it should be the case. In this study I use 1996 National Election Study (NES) data to examine the impact of environmental concern on attitudes toward American political parties and their candidates. Data results on issue positions and proximities confirm that while environmental issues represent a strength of the Democratic ticket, those issues seldom shape individual vote preferences for three reasons: (1) low issue salience; (2) small perceived differences between candidates on matters of environmental policy; and (3) the tendency of environmental concern to cut across traditional (and more powe...

A Statistical History of the American Electorate

Abstract: A data-rich historical picture of American elections and the American electorate, from 1789 to the present."A Statistical History of the American Electorate adds a new, never explored dimension to study of the nationAes political system. Rusk has examined thousands of pieces of information and masses of historical and contemporary numerical data on elections to draw a new picture of our evolving voting ways and byways. His book adds immeasurably to the abundant literature about actual results and voting returns from specific elections by gathering data over time - 200 years - and casting it into historical patterns. The material in each of his eight chapters is introduced with an essay that explains the data and its importance, and sets it all in context."Chapters include: "Election Laws and Suffrage. Lists and dates election laws that define the eligible electorate. Describes qualifications such as property owner-ship, paying taxes, residency, sex, literacy, and many more. Also discusses popular electoral participation such as the initiative and referendum. "Voting Participation. Lists three forms of voting participation - turnout, mobilization, and eligibility - as percentage values by the nation, region, and state. This analysis casts light on voter activity as well as the portion of citizens entitled (or barred) from participating at different times in U.S. history."Presidential, House, Senate, and Gubernatorial Voting. These four chapters show partisan vote percentages at the national, regional, and state level for Democratic, Republican, and Other categories and the Democratic percent of the major two-party vote. The author uses conventional designations of political parties as well as newly designed alternative descriptions that give a more accurate reflection of the partisan nature of each state. "Measures of Voting Behavior. Using data from the other chapters, Rusk shows over 200 years of party competition, partisan swing, split-ticket voting, partisan strength and many other dimensions of the electoral system."No other volume brings together such a rich variety of information and sets it in an analytical context. A must-purchase for scholars, graduate and undergraduate students, libraries with political science collections, and anyone interested in the American electoral system."

Knowing Versus Caring: The Role of Affect and Cognition in Political Perceptions

Abstract: This paper examines the importance of political knowledge in shaping accurate perceptions of the political world—specifically, how levels of general political knowledge influence the accuracy of specific political judgments, how those judgments might also be shaped by “wishful thinking,” and how political knowledge attenuates the impact of wishful thinking on political judgments. Predictions of who would win the U.S. presidential election in 1984, 1988, 1992, and 1996, as surveyed in the National Election Studies conducted in those years, were used as a measure of the accuracy of political perceptions. Analysis of these data reveals that both political knowledge and wishful thinking are important determinants of the accuracy of people's perceptions; in addition, the impact of wishful thinking on perceptions is attenuated by political knowledge.

Congressional Decision Making and the Separation of Powers

Abstract: To what extent does the separation of powers affect congressional roll call voting behavior? To answer this question, I offer a strategic model of congressional decision making that asserts members of Congress pursue public policy goals when casting roll call votes. From the equilibrium predictions of a formal model, I generate testable hypotheses by computing the expected net amount of sophisticated (nonsincere) congressional behavior given changes in decision context. I test the predictions of the theoretical model with data from all civil rights roll call votes from the 83d to the 102d Congress. The results demonstrate that both the other legislative chamber and the Supreme Court profoundly constrain House members and senators when casting roll call votes. This is strong evidence of the importance of policy outcomes to members of Congress when voting on the floor.

Political culture in Libya

Abstract: There have been few studies of Arab countries that have dealt with political culture and political socialisation or focused on people's beliefs, values and attitudes towards the government or political leaders. Undertaking such research in Arab countries, especially when using an empirical method such as survey research, has been very rare. This is because the regimes in power have generally been reluctant to allow opinion to be tested. For Libya, studies have looked at political development, political mobilisation, and political socialisation, but none of them has explored the notion of political culture. The significance of this book is that it assesses the influence of state ideology on the new generation of Libyans, and examines their political culture.

Regional differences and contrasting views

Abstract: The global trend toward political liberalization has been at the center of comparative politics research for more than a decade. During the same period, the unprecedented mobilization of women has also received substantial attention, largely from feminist scholars but also from foundations, human rights groups, and international donors. Yet little of the literature on democratization has considered women's attitudes or participation. Changes in women's voting behavior, their increasing role in national legislatures, and their continuing activism in civil society will affect the quality of democratic leadership, the priorities of policy making, the building of democratic political cultures, and the responsiveness, trans- parency, and sustainability of democratic institutions. Without a clear understanding of the role that women play in these historic changes, the full meaning of the changes themselves cannot be understood. The trajec- tories of women's movements and the vitality of women's organi-zations are important indicators of how well democratic institutions are working on the ground. Women's political participation affects (and is itself shaped by) democratization, and gender analysis can contribute to a deeper under- standing of democratic transitions. This essay presents some of the findings that are emerging from research on women's roles in democ- ratizing states and links them to regional differences in processes of democratization. The diverse paths followed by women's movements in democratizing countries and the contrasting attitudes toward autonomy among women's movements are instructive examples of these regional differences. Another aspect of the relationship between women and Jane S. Jaquette is Bertha Harton Orr Professor in the liberal arts and professor of politics at Occidental College. Her most recent book, coedited with Sharon L. Wolchik, is Women and Democracy: Latin America and Central and Eastern Europe (1998).

Learning by Voting: Sequential Choices in Presidential Primaries and Other Elections

Abstract: The presidential primary season used to be a long sequence of elections. In recent years many states have moved their presidential primaries earlier in the year in the belief that this increases their influence over the choice of presidential nominees. Similarly, in the past most voters have gone to a polling place and voted on election day. Now an increasing number of voters are not voting on election day but are using mail-in or absentee ballots to vote, often weeks before other voters.Does the movement to a large number of early presidential primaries reduce the ability of voters to learn about the candidates? Do voters who vote early miss important information by not following the entire campaign, or are they, as some argue, more partisan? In a unique study Rebecca B. Morton and Kenneth C. Williams investigate the impact these changes have on the choices voters make. The authors combine a formal, theoretical model to derive hypotheses with experiments, elections conducted in labs, to test the hypotheses.Their analysis finds that sequence in voting does matter. In simultaneous voting elections well-known candidates are more likely to win, even if that candidate is the first preference of only a minority of the voters and would be defeated by another candidate, if that candidate were better known. These results support the concerns of policy makers that front-loaded primaries prevent voters from learning during the primary process. The authors also find evidence that in sequential elections those who vote on election day have the benefit of information received throughout the whole course of the campaign, thus supporting concerns with mail-in ballots and other early balloting procedures.This book will interest scholars interested in elections, the design of electoral systems, and voting behavior as well as the use of formal modeling and experiments in the study of politics. It is written in a manner that can be easily read by those in the public concerned with presidential elections and voting.Rebecca B. Morton is Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Iowa. Kenneth C. Williams is Associate Professor of Political Science, Michigan State University.

All Votes Are Not Created Equal: Campaign Contributions and Critical Votes

Abstract: Conclusions from past research on campaign contributions and legislative voting behavior have been ambiguous. Some find a strong relationship between group donations and votes while others find no relationship at all. In attempts to explain these conflicting results, many address the influence of context on this relationship. This article extends those efforts by studying the "vote context." I argue that contributions are more likely to influence a legislator's vote when that vote means the difference between a contributing group's success or defeat on a bill. By studying votes on 102 bills in the California Senate Governmental Organization Committee, I find that contributions have a stronger effect on those votes that are crucial to the outcome of legislation. Therefore, while contributions may influence only a small number of total votes, they have a significant impact on legislative outcomes.

The Political Economy of City Formation in California: Limits to Tiebout Sorting

Abstract: Objective. This paper analyzes the extent to which voter behavior in city formation elections supports Tiebout's (1956) hypothesis that residential sorting facilitates efficiency of local service provision. It develops a two-stage model of city formation to distinguish agenda setting from voter outcomes on city formation proposals. Methods. Logit analysis is used to analyze voting in 71 city formation elections, incorporating Heckman's two-stage procedure to correct for self-selection of local referenda. Results. Community fiscal and demographic factors influence agenda setting more than voting behavior. Wealthier communities in high-growth counties are more likely to propose formation of a city. In contrast, community characteristics have little influence on electoral outcomes, suggesting that boundedly rational voters rely on information heuristics. Conclusions. Although reduction of diversity did not appear to motivate city formation, sorting around residential income, land use preferences, and other demographic variables may facilitate relative efficiency of service provision.

BEYOND CULTURE VERSUS POLITICS A Case Study of a Local Women's Movement

Abstract: This article goes beyond the debate over whether culture competes with politics in the women's movement to explore the complex relationship between cultural and political action. A case study of the local women's movement in Bloomington, Indiana, provides little evidence that cultural feminism led to a decline in political activity in the women's movement. Rather, the attractiveness of cultural and political activities changes with shifts in political opportunities. During periods of opportunity or threat that stimulate extensive action, activists are energized for both cultural and political projects. During “slow” periods when there are few opportunities to make political gains, cultural projects are particularly attractive to feminists and may compete with political activities. However, cultural activities also help to maintain a feminist collective identity and provide networks to political groups. Ongoing political action is provoked by countermovement actions and other critical events and supported ...

The Effects of Political Talk Radio On Political Attitude Formation: Exposure Versus Knowledge

Abstract: The effects of political news on the mass audience are usually difficult to establish empirically. Recent models of mass communication effects have held that political knowledge is a better indicator of media reception than traditional measures of exposure. This claim is tested in two studies of attitudes toward Democratic and Republican leaders during the 1996 U.S. presidential primary campaigns. The impact of messages from three types of political talk radio (PTR) is examined: Rush Limbaugh, other conservative hosts, and liberal/moderate hosts. Political knowledge and exposure to talk radio are found to be equally good predictors of attitudes toward political leaders when studied separately. However, when tested against one another, exposure is the more effective measure. Agreement between Rush Limbaugh's messages and his audience's attitudes toward political figures is consistent and strong. Biased processing of PTR content by audience members with partisan predispositions contrary to those of the host...