Political Knowledge and Policy Representation in the States

2016 ◽  
Vol 45 (6) ◽  
pp. 907-938 ◽  
Author(s):  
William P. Jaeger ◽  
Jeffrey Lyons ◽  
Jennifer Wolak
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
State Government ◽  
Political Knowledge ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
The Public ◽  
National Surveys ◽  
Policy Representation ◽  
Political Outcomes ◽  
Low Levels

Political knowledge is central to the success of representative democracy. However, public policy has been shown to follow public opinion even despite low levels of political information in the electorate. Does this mean that political knowledge is irrelevant to policy representation? We consider whether knowledgeable electorates are better able to achieve representative policy outcomes. Using the heterogeneity in the responsiveness of government across the states, we consider how state political knowledge moderates the connection between citizen ideology and the policy outcomes of state government. Using national surveys and multilevel logit with post-stratification, we develop measures of collective political knowledge in the states. We test whether knowledgeable electorates are more likely to secure representative political outcomes than less politically informed constituencies. We find that as state political knowledge increases, so does the correspondence between the preferences of the public and the ideological tenor of state policy outcomes.

scholarly journals Policy Responsiveness to Public Opinion

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert S. Erikson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
The United States ◽  
Causal Chain ◽  
Causal Mechanism ◽  
Policy Responsiveness ◽  
The Public ◽  
Policy Representation ◽  
Advanced Democracies

Policy responsiveness is a goal of democratic government—that government action responds to the preferences of its citizens. It is conceptually distinct from “representation,” whereby government actions mirror the preferences of public opinion. Governments can be representative without a direct responsiveness causal mechanism. Policy can respond to public opinion but remain biased due to other influences besides the public. Responsiveness is no certain result in a democracy, as there are many links in the causal chain that must be unbroken for it to be at work. Citizens can vote politicians in or out of office based on the adequacy of their policy representation. But are they up for the task? Do elected officials believe they must follow public opinion, and do they know what their constituents want? Ultimately, how strongly does government policy reflect citizen views? This essay addresses these questions. The literature reviewed here covers only policy representation in the United States. For related coverage, including outside the US sphere, see essays by Will Jennings (Mechanisms of Representation) and Christopher Wlezien (Advanced Democracies: Public Opinion and Public Policy in Advanced Democracies) as part of this Oxford Bibliographies in Political Science series. One conclusion is that public opinion is an influential force in determining public policy in the United States, especially when it comes to setting the ideological tone of policy in the states or the nation. The degree of influence may seem surprising given what we know about voters’ capabilities. Yet there is reason for caution as well as optimism. The general public’s influence sometimes faces the headwinds of hostile economic forces. Influence is not equally distributed across all segments of the public.

scholarly journals Public Opinion and Public Policy

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Wlezien ◽  
Stuart N. Soroka
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Policy Change ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Empirical Literature ◽  
Public Preferences ◽  
The Public ◽  
Basic Model ◽  
Policy Representation

The link between the public opinion and public policy is fundamental to political representation. The current empirical literature tests a general model in which policy is considered to be a function of public preferences. The mechanics by which preferences are converted to policy are considered along with extensions of the basic model - extensions through which the magnitude of opinion representation varies systematically acorss issues and political institutions. Thus, public opinion is an independent variable - an important driver of public policy change. With the consideration of 12/1 opinion as a dependent variable, specifically, its responsiveness to policy change - the ongoing existence of both policy representation and public responsiveness is critical to the functioning of representative democracy.

scholarly journals Party Responsiveness to Public Opinion in Young Democracies

2021 ◽  
pp. 003232172199363
Author(s):  
Raimondas Ibenskas ◽  
Jonathan Polk
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Strong Support ◽  
Policy Positions ◽  
The Public ◽  
National Surveys ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Established Democracies ◽  
Expert Surveys ◽  
Cross National

Are political parties in young democracies responsive to the policy preferences of the public? Compared to extensive scholarship on party responsiveness in established democracies, research on party responsiveness in young democracies is limited. We argue that weaker programmatic party–voter linkages in post-communist democracies create incentives for parties to respond to their supporters rather than the more general electorate. Such responsiveness occurs in two ways. First, parties follow shifts in the mean position of their supporters. Second, drawing on the research on party–voter congruence, we argue that parties adjust their policy positions to eliminate previous incongruence between themselves and their supporters. Analyses based on a comprehensive dataset that uses expert surveys, parties’ manifestoes and election surveys to measure parties’ positions, and several cross-national and national surveys to measure voters’ preferences provide strong support for this argument.

scholarly journals Strategi Peningkatan Kompetensi Aparatur Sipil Negara Melalui Peningkatan E-Literasi dan Edukasi Kebijakan Publik

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-36
Author(s):  
Apandi Apandi
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Human Resources ◽  
Research Method ◽  
Public Services ◽  
Improve Performance ◽  
The Public ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
Low Levels ◽  
Performance Results

E-literacy and education are important components in improving the quality of human resources needed in an organization. The purpose of this study is to reveal the importance of e-literacy and public policy education. The State Civil Apparatus (ASN) requires e-literacy and education to improve performance results so that public services can be maximized. This becomes interesting research in the development of science-based on the real events that occur in Indonesia. Where so far, e-literacy and education is only intended for the public, especially millennial generation. The research method used is the study of literature where data is obtained through various secondary sources that are relevant to theoretically strengthen research results. The findings explain that e-literacy and education are effective and efficient strategies in overcoming budget constraints and low levels of ASN competence. With e-literacy and public policy education, it is hoped that the professionalism of the ASN bureaucracy will increase and the quality of public services will be better.

scholarly journals Public Opinion and Public Policy in Advanced Democracies

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Wlezien
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Voting Behavior ◽  
Descriptive Representation ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Roll Call ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
The Government

The representation of public opinion in public policy is of obvious importance in representative democracies. While public opinion is important in all political systems, it is especially true where voters elect politicians; after all, opinion representation is a primary justification for representative democracy. Not surprisingly, a lot of research addresses the connection between the public and the government. Much of the work considers “descriptive representation”—whether the partisan and demographic characteristics of elected politicians match the characteristics of the electorate itself. This descriptive representation is important but may not produce actual “substantive representation” of preferences in policy. Other work examines the positions of policymakers. Some of this research assesses the roll call voting behavior of politicians and institutions. The expressed positions and voting behavior of political actors do relate to policy but are not the same things. Fortunately, a good amount of research analyzes policy. With but a handful of exceptions noted below, this research focuses on expressed preferences of the public, not their “interests.” That is, virtually all scholars let people be the judges of their own interests, and they assess the representation of expressed opinion no matter how contrary to self-interest it may seem.

Public Opinion and Policy Making in Canada 1994–2001

2004 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 505-529 ◽  
Author(s):  
François Petry ◽  
Matthew Mendelsohn
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
Significant Drop ◽  
Majority Opinion ◽  
The Public ◽  
Opinion Publique ◽  
Low Profile ◽  
Jean Chretien ◽  
The Right ◽  
Pour Cent

Abstract. This study examines the consistency between public opinion and public policy during the period 1994–2001 by matching responses to national survey questions on 230 issues with enacted policy proposals on the same issues. Policy outcomes were consistent with majority opinion 49 per cent of the time. This represents a significant drop from 69 per cent during the Mulroney years (1985–1993). Low opinion-policy consistency since 1994 is primarily attributable to divergences between public majorities that are increasingly supportive of a change toward the right and the policies of Jean Chrétien that are more leftist and status quo oriented than those of his predecessor. We argue that these divergences go largely unnoticed by the public because they tend to occur on low-profile issues. On the other hand, the evidence suggests a much tighter correlation between opinion and policy on a small number of high-profile issues of which the public is much more aware, thereby creating the appearance of attentiveness to Canadian public opinion.Résumé. En comparant les décisions sur 230 enjeux de politiques publiques avec les résultats de sondages nationaux sur ces mêmes enjeux, cet article cherche à quantifier le degré d'adéquation entre l'opinion publique et la politique gouvernementale entre 1994 et 2001. Les calculs révèlent que seulement 49 pour cent des décisions du gouvernement de Jean Chrétien sont allées dans le même sens que l'opinion publique, en nette diminution par rapport aux 69 pour cent observés pendant la période Mulroney (1985–1993). La baisse de corrélation depuis 1994 est principalement attribuable à la divergence entre une opinion publique de plus en plus favorable au changement et idéologiquement orientée à droite et la politique du gouvernement de Jean Chrétien sensiblement plus résistante au changement et idéologiquement plus à gauche que celle de son prédécesseur. Le public a tendance à ignorer le manque de corrélation entre l'opinion et les politiques gouvernementales parce que les enjeux en question sont relativement peu importants. Par contre, il semble que la corrélation entre l'opinion et les politiques soit beaucoup plus forte dans un petit nombre d'enjeux importants que le public reconnaît, créant ainsi l'apparence d'un gouvernement attentif aux souhaits de l'opinion publique canadienne.

Constituencies and Public Opinion

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Louise Campbell ◽  
Michael W. Sances
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
Group Influence ◽  
The Public ◽  
Target Populations ◽  
Social Provision ◽  
Degree Of Redistribution ◽  
Modest Degree ◽  
Interest Group Influence

Public opinion alone cannot explain the trajectory of American social policy, but it is crucial in explaining the nature of social provision. Although most Americans are not highly knowledgeable about or interested in politics, and although their opinions are often shaped by misinformation, misperception, and framing effects, public opinion can offer broad guidance to politicians. Indeed, American social policy reflects majority preferences in a variety of ways: in the differential generosity of programs for "deserving" and "undeserving" target populations; in the extensive use of hidden and obscured modes of social provision such as tax expenditures; and in the modest degree of redistribution the American welfare state achieves. In addition, attentive and well-resourced members of the public, who receive the largest benefits from the system, have successfully prevented retrenchment attempts. Public opinion typically operates in conjunction with other factors, such as interest group influence or the institutional structure of the American system, to shape social policy outcomes.

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