Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-03T15:30:11.308Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

On the Limits to Inequality in Representation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

Stuart N. Soroka  and
Christopher Wlezien
Stuart N. Soroka
Affiliation:
McGill University
Christopher Wlezien
Affiliation:
Temple University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The correspondence between public preferences and public policy is a critical rationale for representative democratic government. This view has been put forward in the theoretical literature on democracy and representation (e.g., Dahl 1971; Pitkin 1967; Birch 1971) and in “functional” theories of democratic politics (Easton 1965; Deutsch 1963), both of which emphasize the importance of popular control of policymaking institutions. Political science research also shows a good amount of correspondence between opinion and policy, though to varying degrees, across a range of policy domains and political institutions in the U.S. and elsewhere. This is of obvious significance.Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the 2006 Annual Meetings of the American Political Science Association, Philadelphia, at the Elections, Public Opinion and Parties specialist group, Nottingham, England, and at the 2007 National Conference of the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago. We thank Vinod Menon for assistance with data collection and Kevin Arceneaux, Suzie DeBoef, Harold Clarke, Peter Enns, Mark Franklin, Martin Gilens, John Griffin, Will Jennings, Rich Joslyn, Benjamin Page, David Sanders, David Weakliem, John Zaller, and the anonymous reviewers for comments.

Type
FEATURES
Information
PS: Political Science & Politics , Volume 41 , Issue 2 , April 2008 , pp. 319 - 327
Copyright
© 2008 The American Political Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Althaus, Scott L. 2003. Collective Preferences in Democratic Politics: Opinion Surveys and the Will of the People. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bartels, Larry M. 2005. “Economic Inequality and Political Representation.” Unpublished manuscript. Princeton University.Google Scholar
Bartels, Larry M. 2006. “Is the Water Rising? Reflections on Inequality and American Democracy.” PS: Political Science and Politics 39 (January): 39–42.Google Scholar
Beitz, Charles. 1990. Political Equality: An Essay in Democratic Theory. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berinsky, Adam J. 2004. Silent Voices: Public Opinion and Political Participation in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Birch, Anthony. 1971. Representation. New York: Praeger.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brehm, John. 1993. The Phantom Respondents: Opinion Surveys and Political Representation. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Brooks, Clem, and Jeff Manza. 2006. “Social Policy Responsiveness in Advanced Democracies.” American Sociological Review 71: 474–94.Google Scholar
Brooks, J. E. 1987. “The Opinion-Policy Nexus in France: Do Institutions and Ideology Make a Difference?” Journal of Politics 49: 465–80.Google Scholar
Burstein, Paul. 1998. “Bringing the Public Back in.” Social Forces 77: 27–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Converse, Philip. 1962. “Information Flow and the Stability of Partisan Attitudes.” Public Opinion Quarterly 26: 578–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dahl, Robert A. 1956. A Preface to Democratic Theory. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Dahl, Robert A. 1971. Polyarchy. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Deutsch, Karl. 1963. Nerves of Government. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Easton, David. 1965. A Framework for Political Analysis. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Edelman, Murray. 1964. The Symbolic Uses of Politics. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Edelman, Murray. 1985. “Political Language and Political Reality.” PS: Political Science and Politics 18 (1): 10–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Enns, Peter K. 2006. “The Uniform Nature of Opinion Change.” Presented at the Annual Meeting of American Political Science Association, Philadelphia.Google Scholar
Erikson, Robert S., Gerald C. Wright, and John P. McIver. 1995. Statehouse Democracy. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fenno, Richard F. Jr. 1978. Home Style: House Members in Their Districts. Boston: Little, Brown.Google Scholar
Gilens, Martin. 2004. “Public Opinion and Democratic Responsiveness: Who Gets What They Want From Government?” Social Inequality Working Paper, Russell Sage Foundation.Google Scholar
Gilens, Martin. 2005. “Inequality and Democratic Responsiveness.” Public Opinion Quarterly 69: 778–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Griffin, John D., and Brian Newman. 2005. “Are Voters Better Represented?” Journal of Politics 67: 1206–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Herman, Edward S., and Noam Chomsky. 1988. Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. New York: Pantheon.Google Scholar
Hill, Kim Quaile, and Patricia A. Hurley. 1998. “Dyadic Representation Reappraised.” American Journal of Political Science 43: 109–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hill, Kim Quaile, and Patricia A. Hurley. 2003. “Beyond the Demand-Input Model: A Theory of Representational Linkages.” Journal of Politics 65 (2): 304–26.Google Scholar
Hobolt, Sara B., and Robert Klemmensen. 2005. “Responsive Government? Public Opinion and Government Preferences in Britain and Denmark.” Political Studies 53: 379–402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hutchings, Vincent L. 2003. Public Opinion and Democratic Accountability: How Citizens Learn about Politics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobs, Lawrence R., and Benjamin I. Page. 2005. “Who Influences U.S. Foreign Policy?” American Political Science Review 99: 107–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobs, Lawrence R., and Robert Y. Shapiro. 2000. Politicians Don't Pander: Political Manipulation and the Loss of Democratic Responsiveness. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Manza, Jeff, and Fay Lomax Cook. 2002. “Policy Responsiveness to Public Opinion: The State of the Debate.” In Navigating Public Opinion: Polls, Policy, and the Future of American Democracy, eds. Jeff Manza, Fay Lomax Cook, and Benjamin I. Page. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
McCrone, Donald J., and James H. Kuklinski. 1979. “The Delegate Theory of Representation.” American Journal of Political Science 23: 278–300.Google Scholar
Miller, Warren E., and Donald E. Stokes. 1963. “Constituency Influence in Congress.” American Political Science Review 57: 45–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Monroe, Alan. 1979. “Consistency between Constituency Preferences and National Policy Decisions.” American Politics Quarterly 12: 3–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, Benjamin I., and Robert Y. Shapiro. 1992. The Rational Public. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Petry, F. 1999. “The Opinion-Policy Relationship in Canada.” Journal of Politics 61: 540–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pitkin, Hanna Fenichel. 1967. The Concept of Representation. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Schumaker, Paul D., and Russell W. Getter. 1977. “Responsiveness Bias in 51 American Communities.” American Journal of Political Science 21 (42): 247–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Soroka, Stuart N., and Christopher Wlezien. 2004. “Opinion Representation and Policy Feedback: Canada in Comparative Perspective.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 37: 531–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Soroka, Stuart N., and Christopher Wlezien. 2005. “Opinion-Policy Dynamics: Public Preferences and Public Expenditure in the United Kingdom.” British Journal of Political Science 35: 665–89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stimson, James A., Michael B. MacKuen, and Robert S. Erikson. 1995. “Dynamic Representation.” American Political Science Review 89: 543–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ura, Joseph, and Christopher Ellis. N.d. “Income, Preferences, and the Dynamics of Policy Responsiveness.” PS: Political Science and Politics. Forthcoming.Google Scholar
Weakliem, David. 2003. “Public Opinion Research and Political Sociology.” Research in Political Sociology 12: 49–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weaver, R. Kent, Robert Y. Shapiro, and Lawrence R. Jacobs. 1995. “Trends: Welfare.” Public Opinion Quarterly 59: 606–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weissberg, Robert. 1976. Public Opinion and Popular Government. Englewood Cliffs NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Wlezien, Christopher. 1995. “The Public as Thermostat: Dynamics of Preferences for Spending.” American Journal of Political Science 39: 981–1000.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wlezien, Christopher. 1996. “Dynamics of Representation: The Case of U.S. Spending on Defense.” British Journal of Political Science 26: 81–103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wlezien, Christopher. 2004. “Patterns of Representation: Dynamics of Public Preferences and Policy.” Journal of Politics 66: 1–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar