CHAPTER 7
PUBLIC OPINION
PUBLIC OPINION
A. Explaining the Opinion-Policy Gap
 republican model
 substantive goals vs. peoples’ wants
 polling



accuracy issues
margin of error
active opinion vs. public opinion
PUBLIC OPINION
B. Measuring Public Opinion
 Historic perspective

how much confidence should we
have in polling?
 Accuracy
 poll
 random sampling
 margin of error (sampling error)
 exit polls
 Gallup’s record
II. POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION
How does public opinion influence who wins
elections, which bills get passed, etc.?
 opinion saliency
 opinion stability
 opinion-policy congruence
II. POLITCAL SOCIALIZATION
political socialization
 process by which background characteristics
influence an individual’s political views
A. Agents of socialization
 Family
 Religion
 Gender Gap
 School
 Community/Peers
II. POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION
B. Cleavages in Public Opinion
 Income/Socio-economic class
 Race and ethnicity



African American voters
Latino/hispanic voters
Asian voters
 Region

urban vs. rural attitudes
II. POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION
C. Cross-cutting cleavages
 Presence in any ONE group cannot solely
explain a person’s political views
 Reason why social class is NOT enough
III. POLITICAL IDEOLOGY
 political ideology

“a set of consistent and coherent beliefs about
political policies”
 how can you measure whether people have a
political ideology?




self-identification
searching for “constraint”
Pew polling: Trends in party identification
self survey
III. POLITICAL IDEOLOGY
 liberalism vs. conservatism
classic liberalism vs. traditional conservatism
 modern liberalism vs. modern conservatism
 modern labels
 pure liberals
 pure conservatives
 libertarians
 populists

III. POLITICAL IDEOLOGY
A. Issue Areas
 Economic Policy (issue of government regulation)
 Social Policy (issue of individual freedom)




Pure Liberal
Pure Conservative
Libertarian
Populist
III. Political Ideology
B. Liberal v Conservative
 Extremely liberal: 2%
 Liberal: 10%
 Slightly liberal: 14%
 Moderate: 30%
 Slightly cons: 20%
 Conservative: 21%
 Extremely cons: 4%
III. Political Ideology
Political Elites.
 elites and activists display greater ideological
consistency
 How do elites influence public opinion and
public policy?
 How is the influence of elites on the public
limited?
CHAPTER 8
POLITICAL PARTICIPATION
I. POLITICAL PARTICIPATION
A.THE ISSUE OF NONVOTING
 Defining the “problem”
 voter turnout v. voter registration
 voting age population (VAP)
 voting eligible population (VEP)
 removes from VAP those are
disqualified for some reason
 percentage of registered voters
 registration is the real issue in the U.S.
VOTING AGE POPULATION
TURNOUT AS A
PERCENTAGE OF VAP
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
TURNOUT AS A PERCENTAGE OF
REGISTERED VOTERS
VOTING COMPARED
Country
% VAP Turnout
Compulsory
Voting Laws
Automatic
Registration
Australia
94
Yes
No
Austria
91
No
Yes
Belgium
93
Yes
Yes
Canada
76
No
Yes
Germany
84
No
Yes
Greece
85
Yes
Yes
Italy
91
Yes
Yes
Norway
84
No
Yes
Sweden
86
No
Yes
United Kingdom
75
No
Yes
USA
53
No
No
I. POLITICAL PARTICIPATION
B. Proposed solutions
 Reduce Institutional Barriers
 “Get
out the vote” drives
 Motor Voter Bill (1993)
 Early voting
 Voter ID Laws?
II. THE MOVEMENT TOWARD
MASS DEMOCRACY
A. Movement from state to federal standards
 early state prerogatives:


property requirements
Australian Ballot (1890)
 limits on state prerogatives:





1842 Law regarding House elections
womens’ suffrage
black suffrage
18 to 21 year-old suffrage
direct election of Senators
II. THE MOVEMENT TOWARD
MASS DEMOCRACY
B. African American voting rights
 15th Amendment
 weakened by Supreme Court
 Southern state response:
 literacy test
 poll tax
 white primaries
 grandfather clauses
 voter intimidation
 Voting Rights Act of 1965
II. THE MOVEMENT TOWARD
MASS DEMOCRACY
II. THE MOVEMENT TOWARD
MASS DEMOCRACY
C. Womens’ voting rights
 western states
 19th Amendment (1920)
 changes in election outcomes?
D. Youth Vote
 Voting Rights Act of 1970
 26th Amendment (1971)
II. THE MOVEMENT TOWARD
MASS DEMOCRACY
E. Theories of declining voter participation
(voter turnout)
 popular interest in elections
 lack of competitiveness between the parties
 more accurate/honest vote counts
 registration issues in the U.S.
 top three reasons cited for non-voting:



Not registered
Not convenient
Not interested in candidates
WHY DON’T AMERICANS
VOTE?
 Part I
 Part 2
 George Carlin on voting
III. PARTICIPATION IN
POLITICS
A. Verba and Nie’s six forms of political
participation (1972)
 Inactives (22%)
 Complete activists (11%)
 Voting specialists (21%)
 Campaigners (15%)
 Communalists (20%)
 Parochial participants (4%)
VERBA AND NIE:
CONCLUSIONS
Role of socio-economic status (income,
occupation, and class)
 older, more educated, and wealthier participate
more
Definitions of political participation
 voting is only one area
 majority of political participation takes place in
between elections
III. PARTICIPATION IN
POLITICS
B. Influences on voter participation
 education
 statistics:
 4 years college: 80%
 1-3 years college: 70%
 High School: 50-60%
 Less HS: less 40%
III. PARTICIPATION IN
POLITICS
 Age
 statistics
65+: 70%
 45-64: 70%
 25-44: 60%
 18-24: 40%

III. PARTICIPATION IN
POLITICS
 Religion


church culture
voter mobilization
 Gender
 Race

impact of SES (socioeconomic status)
III. PARTICIPATION IN
POLITICS
C. The Meaning of participation rates
 voting rates vs. participation rates
 proliferation of elections in the U.S.
 turnout rates and SES
RECENT TRENDS
 Presidential Elections


statistics
chart
 Congressional midterm elections


statistics
chart