Information and Democratic ProcessesJohn A. Ferejohn, James H. Kuklinski The golden democratic tradition of an informed and involved electorate freely and rationally choosing its public officials seems to be at odds with American political reality. Thus the questions:On what basis do people vote and form opinions? How does the lack of information at the individual level affect system performance? In this collection twenty-six distinguished political scientists discuss, debate, and define the relationship between information and the democracy it supposedly serves. The contributors address both the empirical and normative aspects of governing in the United States, employing psychological, sociological, and economic perspectives. |
Contents
SOCIAL INTERACTION AND THE TRANSMISSION OF POLITICAL | 21 |
Individual Conversational Choice | 59 |
The Structure of Interaction and the Transmission | 100 |
Copyright | |
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accessibility activity aggregate American Political Science analysis assessments behavior campaign candidates choose citizens CLAM coefficients cognitive competence Congress congressional constituents context conversation Democratic didates discussion domain Downsian dummy coded dynamics economic educated effects election electorate equilibrium evaluation expected experiments Expressivity Figure Friends groups heuristics Huckfeldt identify ideology impact implications incumbent individuals influence informed voters interaction interest issue positions judgments legislators less logit model macroeconomic McKelvey median ment negative voting Opponents Ordeshook outcome party identification perceptions Phillips curve political environment political information Political Science Political Science Review poll preferences presidential problem public dialogue public opinion rational rational expectations Reagan relatively relevant representation representative representative democracy Republican respondents retrospective voting role Ronald Reagan selective attention signals Sniderman social Social Psychology Spiral of Silence Srull strategy structure suggest Table TALK theory tions Tory Higgins unemployment variables views vote choice voting decisions Wyer