Public Opinion
Voting and Political Participation
Parties
Interests Groups
The Media
100

Public Opinion

  • “Those opinions held by private persons which governments find it prudent to heed.”
100

focus group

A method of gauging public opinion by observing a small number of people brought together to discuss specific issues, usually under the guidance of a moderator.

100

patronage

The practice of awarding jobs, grants, licenses, or other special favors in exchange for political support

100

interest groups

Organized groups of people seeking to influence public policy

100

agenda setting

Occurs when readers and watchers of news that relates to issues or topics are influenced by what the press covers in a very specific way—it influences what they think about, not what they think

200

Attitude

An organized and consistent manner of thinking and feeling about people, groups, social issues, or, more generally, any event in one’s environment

200

performance voting:

Basing votes for a candidate or party on how successfully the candidate or party performed while in office.

200

Caucus

A closed meeting of a political or legislative group to choose candidates for office or to decide issues of policy

200

social movements

Amorphous aggregates of people sharing general values and a desire for social change

200

franking privilege

The legal right of each member of Congress to send official mail postage-free under his or her signature

300

Political Socialization

The process by which citizens acquire their political beliefs and values

300

party identification

An individual’s enduring affective or instrumental attachment to one of the political parties; the most accurate single predictor of voting behavior.

300

Duverger’s law

In any election where a single winner is chosen by plurality vote (whoever gets the most votes wins), there is a strong tendency for serious competitors to be reduced to two because people tend to vote strategically. If their favorite party’s candidate has no chance to win, they turn to the less objectionable of the major-party candidates who does have a chance to win

300

selective incentives

Private goods or benefits that induce rational actors to participate in a collective effort to provide a collective good

300

prior restraint

A government agency’s act to prohibit the publication of material or speech before the fact. The courts forbid prior restraint except under extraordinary conditions

400

How is public opinion measured? When can polls be trusted (there are a few things here)

  • select a random sample of the population of interest, ask the people in the sample some appropriate questions about their views, and count up their answers.
  • Larger sample
  • Random sample: give everyone in the population the same chance of being invited face.
400

When are people most likely to vote or participate in politics? Why?

  • People participate when they can meet the costs and appreciate the benefits.
  • Individual level factors: Those with money, education, experience, free time, and self-confidence find it easier to meet the costs; those with a greater psychological stake in politics—from a concern with issues, a sense of obligation to carry out their duties as citizens, or a strong interest in parties or candidates—receive greater benefits (also mainly psychological) from participation.
  • Institutional context: for example, variations in registration laws and the use of different methods of voting—affects turnout.
  • Social circumstances : social connections create personal incentives to participate when, for example, coworkers take note of who is performing their citizen’s duty to vote (and who is wearing the “I voted” sticker).
400

What is polarization? Has it been increasing or decreasing in recent years according to your textbook?

although the parties have grown increasingly divergent demographically—a trend contributing to partisan polarization on issues—the electorate’s changing demographic profile has yet to permanently shift the partisan balance in the Democrats’ favor

400

Explain the free rider problem interest groups face?

  • And to succeed, organizers have to overcome a standard collective action problem: most political interest groups pursue collective goods that, by definition, all group members will enjoy whether or not they help provide them. Rational self-interest could lead to universal free riding, dooming the organization and the effort unless some way is found around this difficulty.
  • Moral incentives
  • Selective incentives
400

Explain the role that media plays in informing the public about politics and government

  • Agenda Setting and Priming: The press have the power to shape people’s priorities, but not to persuade them or change their attitudes about issues or politicians.
  • Going Newsless: The same communications technologies broadening the availability of news are even more actively expanding the range of entertainment options. With so many choices, fewer citizens may be tuning into news and current affairs programming than in the past.
  • Political Polarization: the profusion of news via cable television and the Internet might contribute to the trend toward partisan and ideological polarization among those interested in politics.
  • Fake News.
500

Do voters really think in terms of ideology? Are their attitudes consistent? If not, why are they inconsistent

  • In theory, ideologies promote consistency among political attitudes by connecting them to something greater, a more general principle or set of principles.
  • most citizens get by without them and feel no obligation to be consistently liberal or conservative.
  • Adopting a liberal or conservative pattern is not the only way people organize their political attitudes.
  • Often, however, people remain blissfully unaware of inconsistencies among their attitudes, keeping them in separate mental compartments so they are not brought to mind at the same time by political figures and events.
500

What are the potential problems with delegating authority to representative in government? How do election help reduce these risks?

  • any delegation of authority raises the possibility of agency loss.
  • Whenever we engage people to act on our behalf, we face the risk that they will put their interests ahead of ours. Worse, it is often difficult to tell whether they are faithful agents because we cannot see what they do or know why they are doing it.
  • One effective, if imperfect, solution adopted by representative democracies is to hold regular, free, competitive elections. Elections ameliorate the delegation problem in several ways.
  • First, they give ordinary citizens a say in who represents them.
  • Second, the prospect of future elections gives officeholders who want to keep (or improve) their jobs a motive to be responsive agents.
  • And third, elections provide powerful incentives for the small set of citizens who want to replace the current officeholders to keep a close eye on representatives and to tell everyone else about any misconduct they detect.
500

Know how and why third (minor) parties function in political systems such as the one we have in the United States. Why do minor parties gain representation in most other countries, but not the US?

  • Any idea promoted by a third party that proves to be popular with voters is subject to poaching by one, or sometimes both, of the established parties maneuvering to coopt the disaffected. Thus, incentives to expand electoral coalitions also help reduce the number of parties to two.
  • Elections in the United States have almost always been winner-take-all affairs, so the rules have continually worked to reduce the viable options to two.
  • An alternative kind of electoral system—proportional representation, under which a party receives legislative seats in proportion to its share of votes—is used in many democracies. This system helps preserve smaller parties because votes for their candidates are not wasted.
500

What sorts of benefits do politicians receive from lobbyists? If these groups are so beneficial, why do citizens view them with such suspicion?

  • helping officials plan legislative strategy, assemble legislative coalitions, draft legislation, organize hearings, and write rules and regulations, lobbyists will not so much change minds as activate politicians already on their side by reducing the politicians’ cost of getting involved.
  • make the jobs of regulators and other bureaucrats easier.
  • valuable to bureaucrats as allies in dealing with the elected officials who control their budgets
  • Their very presence, not to mention any political success they may achieve, raises the suspicion that “special interests” win at the expense of the “public interest.”
  • Even people who deny that the public interest can be defined objectively—as do many modern political scientists—often argue that successful lobbying subverts the basic principles of democratic equality and majority rule.
  • policy gridlock and political paralysis in the face of pressing national problems are commonly blamed on the cacophony of competing interests.
500

How and why do political seeks to manipulate the news? What strategies do they use to generate beneficial coverage?

  • Media is important to politicians
  • provided a platform for politicians
  • important to political success.
  • Strategies:
  • press secretary
  • trial balloon: Policy announced by the president in order to test public opinion and floated either by members of Congress or the media.
  • News leak
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