Interest Group Democracy
 Pluralism or Interest Group
Democracy:
 Definition: theoretical understanding of a political
system. It puts forth the belief that democratic values
can be preserved in a system where multiple, competing
democratic representatives (elites) determine public
policy through bargaining and compromise. Interest
groups are instrumental linkage institutions that
continuously connect the demands (interests) of the
people to government. In this framework, interest
groups are assumed to enhance democracy.
Central assumptions of pluralism or interest
group democracy:
 assumes many centers of power
 voters exercise meaningful choices and new elites can
gain access to power
 multiple access points to government as power is
dispersed on many levels and branches of government
 method of government: bargaining and compromise
 electoral majorities rarely rule; all active and legitimate
groups can make themselves heard at some stage in the
policy process, manifested in the rise of interest group
activity
Political Party Relations
 Conflictual party relations: volatile, weak coalitions;
fundamental economic and political differences
ex. Italy, Israel characteristic of multiparty outcomes
 Consensual party relations: usually institutionalized twoparty systems in which both political parties adhere to
similar ideological beliefs; ex. Great Britain; U.S.
characteristic of majoritarian outcomes in Legislature
 Consociational party relations: parties differ
fundamentally on issues but possess established routines
of bargaining and compromise; characteristic of
multiparty outcomes
 Consociational democracy: Institutionalized Power
sharing democracy: Switzerland, Netherlands, Belgium
 characteristic of multiparty outcomes
German Bundestag (Lower
Legislative House)
 Members 612
 Political groups Christian Democratic
Union/Christian Social Union of
Bavaria Bloc (223)
Social Democratic Party of Germany
(222)
Free Democratic Party (61)
The Left. (53)
Alliance '90/The Greens (51)
Voting Behavior
 Conventional political participation
 Political participation that attempts to
influence the political process through
well-accepted, often moderate forms of
persuasion
 Unconventional political participation
 Political participation that attempts to
influence the political process through
unusual or extreme measures, such as
protests, boycotts, and picketing
Elections of Legislatures
 Single-member plurality (SMP): winnertake-all system governed by plurality not
majority rule
example: Congressional elections in U.S.
 Single-transferable vote (STV): voters rank
candidates in order of preference. Any
candidate needs to achieve a set number of
votes (the quota) to be elected. Surplus votes
(votes exceeding quota) are redistributed to
runner-up until all seats are filled example:
Republic of Ireland, Malta
Proportional Representation
 Seats obtained by quota in
multimember constituency
Proportional representation (PR), sometimes referred to as full
representation, is a category of election aimed at a close
match between the percentage of votes that groups of
candidates (grouped by a certain measure) obtain in elections
and the percentage of seats they receive—normally in
legislature
Examples: Israel, Scandinavia, most of continental Europe,
including Eastern Europe, most of Latin America
Corporatism
 State corporatism: Interest groups are
subsumed under state control by
incorporating them into government;
these groups are not partners but
subordinate to government itself.
 Rationale: purpose of interest group
activity is to promote gov’t agenda;
interest groups constituents are asked
to defer their interests to the interest
group leaders (Egypt, Mexico)
Patterns in Voter Turnout
Turnout: the proportion of the voting-age public that votes
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40% of the eligible adult population votes
25% are occasional voters
35% rarely vote
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Whites vote more regularly than African Americans – related to
income and educational differences in the two groups
Hispanics vote less than African Americans
Have potential to wield much influence given their increasing
size
Education: Voters tend to be more educated
Income: More voters have higher incomes
Age: Younger people vote less
Gender: Women vote at the same rate or slightly higher
rate than men
Race and Ethnicity:
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Interest in politics: Those interested in politics vote more
Why Is Voter Turnout So Low?
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Too Busy
Difficulty of Registration
Difficulty of Absentee Voting
Number of Elections
Voter Attitudes
Weakened Influence of Political
Parties
Efforts to Improve Voter Turnout
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Easier Registration and Absentee Voting
Make Election Day a Holiday
Strengthen Parties
Other suggestions
 Holding fewer elections
 Proportional representation system for
congressional elections
 Saturday or Sunday election day
 Making voting mandatory
 Tax credits
 Election weeks rather than election days
 Internet voting
Patterns in Vote Choice
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Party Identification
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Most powerful predictor voter behavior
Ticket-splitting: voting for candidates of different parties for various
offices in the same election
Race and Ethnicity
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Whites increased tendency to vote Republican
African Americans vote overwhelmingly for Democrats
Hispanics also tend to identify with and vote for Democrats
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Asian Americans less monolithic
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Gender gap varies by election
Women today more likely to support Democratic candidates
Poor vote more often for Democrats; wealthier for Republicans
Ideology related closely to vote choice
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Kerry 53 percent; Bush 44 percent
Issues
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Conservatives for Republicans
Liberals for Democrats
Retrospective judgment: focused on present or past
Prospective judgment: focused on future possibilities
Purposes of Elections
 Regular free elections
 guarantee mass political action
 enable citizens to influence the actions of their
government
 Popular election confers on a government
the legitimacy that it can achieve no other
way
 Regular elections also ensure that
government is accountable to the people it
serves
Purposes of Elections
 Electorate
 Citizens eligible to vote
 Mandate:
 A command, indicated by an electorate’s
voters, for the elected officials to carry
out their platforms
 Sometimes the claim of a mandate is
suspect because voters are not so much
endorsing one candidate as rejecting the
other
General Elections
 General elections are those in which
voters decide which candidates will
actually fill elective public offices
 Held at many levels.
 Contests between the candidates of
opposing parties
Initiative, Referendum, and Recall
 Initiative
 An election that allows citizens to propose
legislation and submit it to the state electorate
for popular vote
 Referendum
 An election whereby the state legislature
submits proposed legislation to the state’s
voters for approval
 Recall
 Voters can remove an incumbent from office by
popular vote
 Are very rare
Presidential Elections
 Primary elections or caucuses are
used to elect national convention
delegates which choose the nominee
 Winner-take-all primary
 Proportional representation primary
 Caucus
Primaries v. Caucuses
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Over years, trend has been to use primaries rather than
caucuses to choose delegates
Caucus is the oldest, most party-oriented method of choosing
delegates to the national conventions
Arguments for primaries
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More democratic
More representative
A rigorous test for the candidate
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Caucus participants more informed; more interactive and
informative
Unfair scheduling affects outcomes
Frontloading (being first in the primary calendar) gives some
primary states an advantage
Arguments for caucuses
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Frontloading is the tendency to choose an early date on the
primary schedule
The Party Conventions
 Out-of-power party holds its convention
first, in late July, followed in mid-August by
party holding the presidency
 Conventions were decision-making body in
the 19th century
 Today the convention is fundamentally
different
 Nominations settled well in advance of the
convention
The Electoral College
 Representatives of each state who
cast the final ballots that actually
elect a president
 Total number of electors for each
state equal to the number of senators
and representatives that a state has
in the U.S. Congress
 District of Columbia is given 3
electoral votes
The Electoral College
 Result of compromise between:
 Selection by Congress versus direct popular
election
 Three essentials to understanding the
design of the Electoral College:
 Constructed to work without political parties
 Constructed to cover both the nominating and
electing phases of presidential selection
 Constructed to produce a nonpartisan president
The Electoral College in the
19th Century
 12th Amendment (1804)
 Attempt to remedy the confusion between the
selection of vice presidents and presidents that
emerged in the election 1800
 Provided for separate elections for each office,
with each elector having only one vote to cast
for each
 In event of a tie, the election still went to the
House
 Top three candidates go to House
 Each state House delegation casts one vote