10,625 research outputs found

    Abstention, ideology and information acquisition

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    We consider an election in which each voter can collect information of different precision. Voters have asymmetric information and preferences that vary both in terms of ideology and intensity. In contrast to all other models of voting with endogenous information, in equilibrium voters collect information of different qualities. We show that information and abstention are not necessarily negatively correlated: some voters are more likely to abstain the more informed they are. We also discuss the manner in which incentives to acquire information are non-monotonic in terms of both ideology and the level of intensity. © 2013 Elsevier Inc

    Election Law and White Identity Politics

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    The role of race in American politics looms large in several election law doctrines. Regrettably, though, these doctrines’ analyses of race, racial identity, and the relationships between race and politics often lack sophistication, historical context, or foresight. The political status quo is treated as race-neutral, when in fact it is anything but. Specifically, the doctrines rely upon sanguine theories of democracy uncorrupted by white identity–based political calculations, while in fact such calculations, made on the part of both voters and political parties, are pervasive. In this Article, I appraise the doctrine pertaining to majority-minority voting districts, racial gerrymandering doctrine, the doctrine governing ballot access disputes, and campaign finance doctrine through the lens of white identity politics. Drawing from research in political science, sociology, and history, I argue that these doctrines are blighted by what I identify as “racial blind spots” that are inconsonant with political reality. Given the role that courts play in enunciating these doctrines, their failure to meaningfully engage with the significance of white identity politics renders their governing frameworks and remedial prescriptions inapt. The Article concludes by offering a number of suggestions, both doctrinal and legislative, for how to mitigate white identity politics

    Happy voters

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    In this paper we investigate whether or not recent initiatives taken by governments and international organizations to come up with indicators of Subjective Well Being (SWB) to inform policy makers go in the same direction as citizens expectations on what policy makers should do. We test retrospective voting hypotheses by using standard measures of SWB as a proxy for utility instead of the commonly used indicators of economic and financial circumstances. Using the British Household Panel Survey Data we find that citizens who are satisfied with their life are more likely to cast their vote in favour of the ruling party, even taking into account ideological preferences. We show that SWB influences voting decision even when the event affecting the SWB is beyond the government’s control, like the spouse death

    Political Activism and Research Ethics

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    Those who care about and engage in politics frequently fall victim to cognitive bias. Concerns that such bias impacts scholarship recently have prompted debates—notably, in philosophy and psychology—on the proper relationship between research and politics. One proposal emerging from these debates is that researchers studying politics have a professional duty to avoid political activism because it risks biasing their work. While sympathetic to the motivations behind this proposal, I suggest several reasons to reject a blanket duty to avoid activism: (1) even if it reduced bias, this duty would make unreasonable demands on researchers; (2) this duty could hinder research by limiting viewpoint diversity; (3) this duty wrongly implies that academia offers a relative haven from bias compared to politics; and (4) not all forms of political activism pose an equal risk of bias. None of these points suggest that researchers should ignore the risk of bias. Rather, researchers should focus on stronger evidence-based strategies for reducing bias than a blanket recommendation to avoid politics

    Race and the Race for the White House: On Social Research in the Age of Trump

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    As it became clear that Donald Trump had a real base of political support, even as analysts consistently underestimated his electoral prospects, they grew increasingly fascinated with the question of who was supporting him (and why). However, researchers also tend to hold strong negative opinions about Trump. Consequently, they have approached this research with uncharitable priors about the kind of person who would support him and what they would be motivated by. Research design and data analysis often seem to be oriented towards reinforcing those assumptions. This essay highlights the epistemological consequences of these tendencies through a series of case studies featuring prominent and influential works that purport to explain the role of race and racism in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. It demonstrates that quality control systems, which should catch major errors, seem to be failing in systematic ways as a result of shared priors and commitments between authors, reviewers and editors – which are also held in common with the journalists and scholars citing and amplifying this work – leading to misinformation cascades. Of course, motivated reasoning, confirmation bias, prejudicial study design, and failure to address confounds are not limited to questions about Trump – however they seem to be particularly pronounced in this case due to the relative homogeneity and intensity of scholars’ views about this topic as compared to other social phenomena. “Trump studies,” therefore, provides fertile ground for exploring how social research can go awry – and the consequences of these failures -- particularly with respect to work on contentious and politically-charged topics

    More than a passive interest

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    Abstract The defeat of the Dyer anti-lynching bill in 1922 was a turning point in relations between black Americans and the Republican Party. Little is understood, however, about the role played in the debates by President Warren Harding. This article contends that Harding's conflicted approach to presidential leadership caused him to mishandle the bill. The President's inability to choose between restrained 'whig' leadership and a more active 'stewardship' role resulted in an unstable executive style. The Dyer bill's failure was affected by this dilemma as black hopes were alternately raised and dashed by Harding's indecision. The bitterness of the bill's ultimate defeat was thus heightened, with severe consequences for the Republican party's long term electoral relationship with black voters

    Neoliberal Political Law

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    Partisan Asymmetries in Online Political Activity

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    We examine partisan differences in the behavior, communication patterns and social interactions of more than 18,000 politically-active Twitter users to produce evidence that points to changing levels of partisan engagement with the American online political landscape. Analysis of a network defined by the communication activity of these users in proximity to the 2010 midterm congressional elections reveals a highly segregated, well clustered partisan community structure. Using cluster membership as a high-fidelity (87% accuracy) proxy for political affiliation, we characterize a wide range of differences in the behavior, communication and social connectivity of left- and right-leaning Twitter users. We find that in contrast to the online political dynamics of the 2008 campaign, right-leaning Twitter users exhibit greater levels of political activity, a more tightly interconnected social structure, and a communication network topology that facilitates the rapid and broad dissemination of political information.Comment: 17 pages, 10 figures, 6 table
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