Wasow asks how stigmatized minorities break through hostile majorities to influence elites, media and voters. Analyzing black-led protests (1960–72), he shows nonviolent actions are associated with increased media attention, sympathetic framing, congressional speech, and local rises in Democratic presidential vote share (about 1.6–2.5%). For 1968, an instrumental analysis using rainfall estimates violent protests shifted white voting toward Republicans by roughly 1.5–7.9%.
New analysis examines how legislators set agendas on social media. Researchers analyzed fine-grained temporal patterns in tweets sent by members of Congress and citizens during the 113th U.S. Congress.
Dominant visions of representative democracy assume parties focus on contrasting issues during campaigns, producing a diverse political supply. However, empirical backing for that claim is scarce. Parties face weak incentives to leave potentially rewarding issues to rivals, and uncertainty about electorate preferences drives strategic monitoring of competitors.
Majority party floor control changes both what gets taken up in the legislature and how individual legislators vote. A rare, exogenous shock to party majorities provides a clean test of these effects and resolves conflicting results from earlier correlational work.
When economic downturns threaten popularity, electoral autocrats can use propaganda to either deflect blame onto other actors or steer public attention away from the economy. Evidence is limited on which strategy actually changes citizens’ views.
The COVID-19 pandemic brought widespread attention to correcting health-related misperceptions. This research examines how effective corrections are when combined with scientific consensus messages or partisan viewpoints. A survey experiment was conducted using field experiments across three topics: COVID-19 threat, climate change threat, and vaccine efficacy.
Does knowing your preferred policy alternatives were ignored make you less happy? This study explores how public attitudes shift when aware of majority-party agenda-setting decisions.
Why do political parties pay attention to interest groups? This article examines how German parties respond to lobbying influence versus voter concerns across eleven issue areas and seven elections from 1987-2009.
Roll rates measure how often legislators vote with their party's majority. Counterfactual Roll Rate Simulation
The Trio Presidency system in the European Union influences voting behavior.
This article analyzes original data from Latin America and Central and Eastern Europe to evaluate the Human Rights Committee's (HRC) influence on states' normative agendas and the roles states portray in the international human rights regime.
This paper introduces a new typology for measuring legislative agenda setting power, moving beyond traditional metrics that capture only one aspect.
Recent U.S. election law reforms increase signature requirements for citizen-initiated ballot measures, reducing their frequency and success rates on Election Day.