Dynamic Democracy: Public Opinion, Elections, and Policymaking in the American States (Chicago Studies in American Politics) - Softcover

Caughey, Devin; Warshaw, Christopher

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0226822222 ISBN 13: 9780226822228

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 2022

Synopsis

A new perspective on policy responsiveness in American government.

Scholars of American politics have long been skeptical of ordinary citizens’ capacity to influence, let alone control, their governments. Drawing on over eight decades of state-level evidence on public opinion, elections, and policymaking, Devin Caughey and Christopher Warshaw pose a powerful challenge to this pessimistic view. Their research reveals that although American democracy cannot be taken for granted, state policymaking is far more responsive to citizens’ demands than skeptics claim.

Although governments respond sluggishly in the short term, over the long term, electoral incentives induce state parties and politicians—and ultimately policymaking—to adapt to voters’ preferences. The authors take an empirical and theoretical approach that allows them to assess democracy as a dynamic process. Their evidence across states and over time gives them new leverage to assess relevant outcomes and trends, including the evolution of mass partisanship, mass ideology, and the relationship between partisanship and ideology since the mid-twentieth century; the nationalization of state-level politics; the mechanisms through which voters hold incumbents accountable; the performance of moderate candidates relative to extreme candidates; and the quality of state-level democracy today relative to state-level democracy in other periods.

About this title

About the Author

Devin Caughey is associate professor of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is the author of The Unsolid South. Christopher Warshaw is associate professor of political science at George Washington University.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 2022
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0226822222
• ISBN 13: 9780226822228
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 230