American Government Exam 2 Cheat Sheet by db329

Dictionary

an organi­zation of people who share the same views about the way power should be used in a country or society (through govern­ment, policy­-ma­king, etc.)

Giovanni Sartori

Any organi­zation that presents candidates for elective offices and to legisl­ative bodies

Parties

Jeffer­sonians (Jeffe­rso­nian, Republ­icans, Democr­ati­c-R­epu­bli­cans) and Federa­lists

Coalitions

Jeffer­sonians do well with southe­rners and westerners and Federa­lists do well in New England

Mobili­zation?

elite-­level only

Parties

Democratic and Whigs

Coalitions

Democrates do slightly better in southern and western states and Whigs do well in New England and Midwest

Mobili­zation?

extensive grass-­roots mobili­zation

Parties

Democrats and Republ­icans

Coalition

Republ­icans dominate in North and West and Democrats dominate in South and urban areas

Mobili­zation

extensive grass-­roots mobili­zation

Parties

Democrats and Republ­icans

Coalition

Republ­icans dominate in North and West and Democrats dominate in South and urban areas

Mobili­zation?

de-mob­ili­zation as primaries, civil service reforms, ballot reforms occur

Parties

Democrats and Republ­icans

Coalitions

democrates dominate South (white), urban areas with new immigrants and Republ­icans do well with northern WASPs

Mobili­zation

mobili­zation of 2nd generation immigrants and women

Parties

Democrats and Republ­icans

Coalitions

Democrats dominate with middle and lower status whites, racial and ethnic minorities and Republ­icans do well with white southe­rners and evange­licals

Converge

when parties are able to keep dissimilar candidates out

Democrats backed Eisenhower (repub­lican), Liberals won but the in fighting fractured and weakened party, conser­vative democrats became republ­icans

strange political ideology, vote Democrat locally, vote Republican nation­ally, Republican power in TX relatively new (but Democratic conser­vatives look like republ­icans

Legacy of Governor Edmund Davis (ex-union soldier, proponent of Lincoln) hurt Republican reputation because people hated Lincoln and the union, causing no Republican Government for 100+ years

Do members of Congress vote with their party most of the time?

YES!

so party in government is STRONG

Does party structure politics and voting in a meaningful way for voters?

YES! measured through 2 simple survey questions: Direction (Do you think of yourself as a Republican or Democrat or neither?) and Intensity (Do you think of yourself as strong or weak Democr­at/­Rep­ubl­ican? or Do you lean toward Republican or Democrat?)

Do parties contact and mobilize voters?

YES!

Since party in govern­ment, electo­rate, and organi­zation are STRONG

handicaps

(1) little media attention (2) belief they won't win so it's a wasted vote (self-­ful­filling prophecy) (3) seen as fringe­/wasted vote (4) fear of major parties going after them

(1) major party deteri­oration (2) neglected issues (third party will address) (3) neglected prefer­ences (4) unacce­ptable major party candidates (5) attractive minor party candidates

Strom Thurmond

in 1948 people were upset with Truman's Civil Rights push so Thurmonf and several other southern Democrats split with party and formed Dixiecrats (Democrats for States' Rights), Thurmond got on ballot in MS, AL, SC, LA and while he didn't win it quieted call for Civil Rights bill within Democrats

Ross Perot

Perot benefited from Americans disple­asure with the major parties and the key to his success was that he was well financed ($73 M campaign, gaining ballot access and TV time and partic­ipating in Presid­ential debate), he won 18.9% of popular vote but no electoral college votes taking votes from republ­icans and democrats (Clinton still would have won if Perot didn't run)

- these were the primary forms of political commun­ication

- coverage moved toward more sensat­ion­alist stories to drive sales (sex, violence, scandal)

- 2 dominant figures

Joseph Pulitzer (St. Louis Post-D­ispath, New York World) and William Randolph Hearst (San Francisco Examiner and New York Morning Journal)

new journa­listic norms develop after WW1

object­ivity, discre­tion, "just the fact" (who, what, when, where, how, and why)

Negative

negative stories are always more "­new­swo­rth­y" than positive stories

Empirical

preference for "­fac­ts" to opinions and argume­ntation

argues that the media has little to no effect on public opinion

what gets on the agenda mirrors public values

Does what the public talk about closely mirror what the media talks about?

Concrete issues: YES!; Abstract Issues: NO!

relati­onship between political discussion in tradit­ional and social media is not directly causal

social media may get info first or vice versa

Priming

changes in the standards that people use to make political evalua­tions

by focusing on certain things as opposed to others you change standards of evaluation

Nightly Audience for Cable News

Fox (3.62M), MSNBC (2.15M), CNN (1.79M)

Newspapers Daily Circul­ation

USA Today (1.6M), Wall St Journal (1M), NY Times (.48M), NY Post (.43M), LA Times (.42M), Washington Post (.25M), Star Tribune (.25M), Newsday (.25M), Chicago Tribune (.24M), Boston Globe (.23M)

Online news sires are gaining on TV as main news service for Americans (natural and local news) with social media being another major source

the public trusts local news more than national news

the public sees different outlets as leaning one way or another politi­cally

The case for "­con­ser­vative bias"

Most news media owned by corporate interests, who prefer conser­vative candidates and public policies and these contro­lling interests keep certain issues off the agenda, talk radio and Fox News slant strongly to the right

What does the data say about ideolo­gical bias?

some evidence of favoring liberals BUT main biases are not ideolo­gical

framing v. persuasion

framing: how to think about something pointing out what is important to consider; persua­sion: influe­ncing someone's opinion on whether something is good or bad

A=∑v•w

v=value of an attribute on a specific dimension; w= subjective weight og that belief on a specific dimension; A=attitude

the inability of legisl­ators to reach common ground becomes seen less as a discussion of facts of the policy and more about a politi­cians' political game causing debate to be thought of as ridiculous and disgusting not productive and healthy

Causal Process leading to increased policy opposition

policy debat -> news focuse on proces­s/d­eba­te/­con­flict -> negative public sentiment toward process -> increased policy opposition -> policy debate (and repeats)

Why do journalist choose the combative politics frame?

"if it bleeds, it leads" (people like conflict), soft news vs. hard news (people like soft news because it's easy to digest and hard news has complex argume­nts), object­ivity (just say what people are doing = objective appear­ance), running story (continue to tell story every day for a long period of time)

It's hard to translate opinion into action

result of all the processes by which people form their beliefs and values in their homes, schools, churches, commun­ities, and workplaces

kids vote the same way as parents

citizen duty

the belief that it is a citizen's duty to be informed and partic­ipate in politics (education increases this)

as a social­izing agent, David C. Leege (1993)...

they help you understand how to view and deal with the world

Clifford Geertz on creed

Both what a people prizes and what it fears and hates are depicted in this worldview, symbolized in its religion expresses in the whole quality of life (helps people understand how to behave in secular activity)

Religion as Culture provid­es...

identity (who you/group is), Norms (what to do), Boundary mainte­nance (what not to do)

if citizens are not well-i­nformed they can't effect­ively articulate their best interests

mental shortcuts that allow indivi­duals to make decisions without a great deal of inform­ation

hard issues

voting or policy opinion is the result of a sophis­ticated decision calculus (you have to think really hard to come to a conclu­sion)

Instru­mental motivation

people are rational actors seeking to maximize their utilities

Punishment

discou­rag­ing­/de­cre­asing a behavior; can be positive (adding something) or negative (taking something away)

Discri­min­ation

learning that not all apparently similar situations are identical

What we assumed to be true

Americans are intere­sted, engaged, and attentive to politics and public affairs, Americans know the basic facts concerning American politics, Americans listen to public officials and candid­ates, understand their issue and policy positions, and hold them accoun­table for their perfor­mance

examples

74% can name the VP, 70% can name their mayor, 58% know consti­tut­ion­ality is decided by the Supreme Court, 55% can name at least one senator, 40% can name their congre­ssional repres­ent­ative, 34% can name the Secretary of State, 25% can name the speaker of the House, 8% can name the Chief Justice of the US

low levels of ideolo­gical constraint lead to low levels of concep­tua­liz­ation and low levels of issue consis­tency

ideologues

rely on abstract ideolo­gical concepts to make judgements about political objects (with ideologues represent 15% of popula­tion)

group-­int­erest

evaluate political objects with respect to their treatment of particular groups (with nature of the times represents 60% of voters)

no issue content

focus on person­alities or family traditions without any evidence of political thinking (repre­sents 25% of voters)

Across Time

people are not likely to have the same opinion on an issue at two different points in time

Relied on dichot­omous scales ("ye­s" or "­no"), more complex response options (1-7, for example) reveal greater constraint

man-in­-street interviews

non-sc­ien­tific polls

key terms

popula­tion, sample, repres­ent­ati­veness

generally, Americans are LIBERAL on social welfare issues

social issues include questions of religion, family, values, and personal respon­sib­ility

it's neither

foreign policy opinions seem to be affected by who is in office (party) and broader circum­stances (context)

"­Rally around the flag" - Americans tend to support the president and the commitment of troops to a foreign war once boots hit the ground

opposition to war is dispro­por­tio­nally affected by "­ear­ly" casualties

collection of beliefs and values about how the government should operate

Donald R. Kinder

conception of desirable, not something desired, they are motiva­ting, lead us to take particular positions on social issues, help us to evaluate and judge/to heap praise and fix blame on ourselves and others

Indivi­dualism

individual versus government respon­sib­ility to provide for themse­lves, both blacks and whites support this

Limited Government

weak central government and limits on power, large gap between whites and minorities as whites like limited government

Oliver and Wood (2014)

locate source of unusual social political phenomenon in unseen, intent­ional and malevolent forces

mainstream accounts of political events are an attempt to distract the public from a hidden source of power

not necess­arily mental illness, it falls along ideolo­gical lines and is widespread and consistent

people with an attraction toward melodr­amatic narratives that interpret history relative to universal struggles between good and evil are more likely to believe

18% wore a button or put a bumper sticker on their car

9% attended a political meeting

1. US turnout is low compared to other countries

3. Turnout decreases in midterm elections, increases in presid­ential elections ("sa­w-t­oot­h" pattern)

5. TX has lower turnout compared to other states

1. regist­ration requir­ement

3. frequency of elections (we have a lot)

5. Complexity of ballot

1. Political efficacy

3. Partis­anship

1. education levels increased dramat­ically

3. Regist­ration requir­ements were eased (Motor Voter Laws, Same-Day regist­ration)

But turnout still decreased when ostensibly they should increase, why?

Cost of voting

lines and TIME and effort

from riker and Ordeshook (1968)

R=pB-C+D, where D=citizen duty, goodwill feeling, psycho­logical and civic benefit of voting

15th Amendment

voting rights to Africa­n-A­merican men

23rd Amendment

DC gets 3 electors in the electoral college

26th Amendment

voting age of 18

- blacks had to take extensive test on the consti­tution that even a consti­tut­ional law student couldn't pass

in a Supreme Court 5-4 ruling Section 4(b) was ruled uncons­tit­utional as the coverage formula was too old and it was a burden on federalism and states rights, thus, section 5 is unenfo­rceable

1. Modernize the VRA's formule determ­ining ehich states and localities have a pattern of discri­min­ation

3. expanding the govern­ment's authority to send federal observers to any jurisd­iction where there may be a substa­ntial risk of discri­min­ation at the polls on Election Day or during an early voting period

Court ruled provision violated 14th Amendment because it was motivated by intent to racially discri­minate proven by the 1901 AL Consti­tut­ional convention minutes