Who Takes the Blame? The Strategic Effects of Collateral Damage

Can civilians caught in civil wars reward and punish armed actors for their behavior? If so, do armed actors reap strategic benefits from treating civilians well and pay for treating them poorly? Using precise geo‐coded data on violence in Iraq from 2004 through 2009, we show that both sides are punished for the collateral damage they inflict. Coalition killings of civilians predict higher levels of insurgent violence and insurgent killings predict less violence in subsequent periods. This symmetric reaction is tempered by preexisting political preferences; the anti‐insurgent reaction is not present in Sunni areas, where the insurgency was most popular, and the anti‐Coalition reaction is not present in mixed areas. Our findings have strong policy implications, provide support for the argument that information civilians share with government forces and their allies is a key constraint on insurgent violence, and suggest theories of intrastate violence must account for civilian agency.     

More Important,but for What Exactly? The Insignificant Role of Subjective Issue Importance in Vote Decisions

Political Behavior - The nature of democratic governance is intimately connected with how citizens respond to candidate position taking. But when will a generally uninformed public base its vote...     

What is Issue Competition? Conflict,Consensus and Issue Ownership in Party Competition

Empirical assessments of issue competition lack both conceptual precision in the use of the concept of “policy issue”, and sufficient studies integrating both salience and positional perspectives. This article specifies an operational definition of a “policy issue” suited for the analysis of issue competition in the electoral arena and beyond, and proposes a typology of electoral issues that takes into account the two sides of issue competition – the decision to address an issue, and the adoption of a diverging or similar position on it. This typology allows distinguishing proprietal, consensual, blurred and conflictual issues. The framework is illustrated with an analysis of EU-related issues in the electoral manifestos of British, French and German parties. This source did not enable us to identify any blurred issue, but our exploratory study delivers several conclusions regarding the other issue types. Proprietal issues appear to be marginal, indicating that parties tend to devote attention to the same issues and that issue ownership is highly contested. We further observe a primacy of consensus in EU-related discourses, especially among governing parties.     

Who Learns from What in Policy Diffusion Processes?

The idea that policy makers in different states or countries may learn from one another has fascinated scholars for a long time, but little systematic evidence has been produced so far. This article improves our understanding of this elusive argument by distinguishing between the policy and political consequences of reforms and by emphasizing the conditional nature of learning processes. Using a directed dyadic approach and multilevel methods, the analysis of unemployment benefits retrenchment in OECD countries demonstrates that policy makers learn selectively from the experience of others. Right governments tend to be more sensitive to information on the electoral consequences of reforms, while left governments are more likely to be influenced by their policy effects.     

Abortion Law and Scotland: An Issue of What?

In recent years, several decisions have been made regarding the devolution of abortion laws from central government at Westminster to the devolved regions of the United Kingdom. This article considers the decision to devolve abortion law to Scotland. It addresses Westminster debates from the time, employing a discursive analysis to examine the arguments made for this legislative move. It argues that the debate was largely a proxy argument for the broader question of Westminster–Edinburgh relations and Scottish independence. It further argues that utilising abortion in this way is problematic, and politicises an area which is better seen as an issue solely of women's rights.     

Who stands for the norm? The place of metonymy in androcentric language

Since its emergence as an academic discipline in the early 1970s, feminist commentary and scholarship has prosecuted a critique of androcentric or sexist (gender exclusive) language, which has to some extent been successful. The struggle by women to occupy a positive linguistic space is continually being challenged by the endemic nature of masculine bias, which is realized through “indirect” or “subtle” sexism in the community. Seemingly innocuous words, like guy/guys, are frequently used to represent both men and women, reminiscent of the previous use of man/men as gender-inclusive common nouns. This raises the question of how to account for the persistence of such language use in spite of the fact that attention is regularly drawn to its problematic character. In this paper we approach the matter in a novel way, by appealing to work in the field of cognitive semantics, in particular the conceptual theory of metonymy. We propose that the relationship between the concepts of masculine and feminine as these are typically structured through language is indicative of a metonymy THE MASCULINE FOR THE FEMININE, in which the masculine “stands for” the feminine and in which lexical items are given as inclusive yet in effect refer to one (normative) gender. A corollary is that the feminine is subsumed (really or virtually) by the presence of the masculine and is made to disappear, and only reappears when she needs to be specified within the contextual frame.     

What about non-diffusion? The effect of competitiveness in policy-comparative diffusion research

Many scholars have convincingly shown that policies diffuse between national and sub-national entities for several different reasons. Although diffusion processes are empirically proven, we witness two shortcomings in the discussion: First, there is a lack of comparative research across policy areas. Second, the question of why diffusion might not occur in a certain domain is under-theorized and lacks an empirical test. By comparing the rationale behind diffusion processes in two policy domains??energy policy and locational policy??this paper shows that two aspects matter for diffusion processes: First is the observability of policy measures, that is, how easily things can be observed by others; second is the competitiveness of the policy domain. If policy measures can be hidden easily and the policy domain is highly competitive, policy diffusion is very unlikely to happen. Therefore, we seek the integration of these two aspects in prospective diffusion research.     

Who is responsible for what? Clarity of responsibilities in multilevel states: The case of Spain

There is a theoretical disagreement between the classical normative positive view on decentralisation, which states that the fragmentation of power shifts policy more closely into line with citizens' preferences, and a more recent critical view that states that decentralisation blurs attribution of responsibility. This disagreement can only be resolved by refining the understanding of specific institutional designs. The theoretical claim in this article is that the relation between multilevel governance and clarity of responsibilities is contingent upon the type of decentralisation in place. To test this proposition, individual data from an asymmetrically decentralised system – the Spanish State of Autonomies – are used. Results show that the relationship between decentralisation and clarity of responsibility has a u‐shape. Responsibility attribution is clearer in regions with high and low levels of decentralisation, where one level of government clearly predominates over the other, than in regions with a more intertwined distribution of powers.     

What to Do Here? What to Do There? The Effect of Change in Organization Size on Public Management

For a long time, researchers have been interested in the consequences of creating larger public organizations. The outcomes of changes in the size of public organizations have been relatively widely studied; however, much less is known about the internal processes through which these outcomes are actually achieved. This article explores whether changes in organizational size affect public management. As endogeneity is an inherent problem when studying outcomes of organizational size, we apply a quasi-experimental design in order to establish the causal linkage between size and different elements of public management. We use unique survey data collected before and after a large reform that changed the size of most Danish municipalities. The results suggest that public management related to daily operations is generic and not affected by size, whereas public management related to overall tasks such as creating a vision, servicing the mayor, and maintaining external relations is positively affected by size changes.     

Who Engages in the Coproduction of Local Public Services and Why? The Case of Atlanta,Georgia

With the resurgent interest in coproduction, questions arise around who joins with government in coproducing services and why. This article reports an exploratory study of these questions using data from Atlanta, Georgia. To guide the research, the article first proposes a set of hypotheses on involvement in coproduction based on theories of political participation, where psychological motivations and social factors dominate, and citizen‐initiated contacting, where perceived needs for public services are usually primary. The hypotheses are tested using survey data on the engagement of 797 neighborhood organization participants in various forms of local coproduction in Atlanta. The findings provide some support for both theories along with evidence for significant idiosyncratic variations suggested by neither theory. A concluding section considers implications of the findings for future research and for public management.     

Who is responsible? The effect of clarity of responsibility on voter turnout

Does voters’ ability to discern who is responsible for policy outcomes affect voter turnout? Although particular institutional arrangements which influence this ability – known as clarity of responsibility – appear to affect how voters form retrospective judgements, existing literature is less informed about its role on voter turnout. This article argues that voters tend to turn out less if they cannot discern who is responsible for policy outcomes. This lack of clarity hinders the process of retrospective evaluations, makes the electoral stakes less profound, and dampens the voters’ political efficacy. Using 396 elections in 34 established democracies between 1960 and 2015, it is found that lower clarity of responsibility is associated with lower voter turnout. This study highlights the importance of clarity of responsibility, as it enhances democratic accountability, not only by encouraging retrospective voting, but also by increasing political participation.     

Who talks about what? Issue strategies across the party hierarchy

We combine the recent literature on issue competition with work on intra-party heterogeneity to advance a novel theoretical argument. Starting from the premise that party leaders and non-leaders have different motivations and incentives, we conjecture that issue strategies should vary across the party hierarchy. We, therefore, expect systematic intra-party differences in the use of riding the wave and issue ownership strategies. We test this claim by linking public opinion data to manually coded information on over 3600 press releases issued by over 500 party actors across five election campaigns in Austria between 2006 and 2019. We account for self-selection into leadership roles by exploiting transitions into and out of leadership status over time. The results show that party leaders are more likely than non-leaders to respond to the public's issue priorities, but not more or less likely to pursue issue-ownership strategies.     

The Rise of the Middle Ground in Northern Ireland: What does it Mean?

Among the many consequences of Brexit for Northern Ireland has been how it has contributed to and coincided with some alteration of the electoral landscape. This includes the rise of the centre ground and, in particular, the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland (APNI). This article focusses specifically on how the Alliance Party, as the largest of Northern Ireland's middle ground parties, has navigated the Brexit period and with what effect. The analysis explores the implications of the growing size and strength of the Alliance Party for Northern Ireland politics, institutions, policies, north-south relations and the constitutional future. It concludes that although the nationalist versus unionist binary remains valid and consequential in Northern Ireland, it is being challenged and tested by the rise of the middle ground in ways which offer both opportunities and challenges for Northern Ireland's future.     

The Politics of Aging: Age Difference in Welfare Issue Salience in Japan 1972–2016

Political Behavior - This paper examines a factor affecting why the interests of the older electorate often prevail in politics in developed countries with aging populations, namely the difference...     

Variability or Moderation? The Effects of Ambivalence on Political Opinions

Prior research theorizes that ambivalence makes opinions about an object unreliable in the sense of being haphazard, unpredictable, or variable. As such, ambivalence is a prominent explanation for seeming nonattitudes in opinion surveys. This study proposes an alternative account of the effects of ambivalence on attitudes. It posits that people who are ambivalent about an issue split the difference between their conflicting considerations by taking a position near the middle of the bipolar opinion scale, which reflects a moderate attitude. I show how the widely-used method of modeling the supposed variability of ambivalent opinions conflates variability and moderation. This problem is addressed by modeling variability and moderation of attitudes separately, without this confound. Using this strategy in analyses involving four datasets and three policy domains, the results show that ambivalence is associated with moderate, not variable, attitudes. Ambivalence does not increase the variability of opinions but, rather, moves them quite predictably toward the middle of the response scale. The results recast our understanding of the effects of ambivalence on political opinions and raise questions about the ability of ambivalence to explain nonattitudes in surveys.     

Do Voters Follow? The Effect of Party Cues on Public Opinion During a Process of Policy Change

A large body of literature has demonstrated how citizens use party endorsements when shaping their policy opinions. However, recent studies question the centrality of party cues in shaping public opinion. This study advances the literature with a four‐wave panel survey design that measures citizens’ policy opinions before, during and after a controversial policy proposal to ban street begging was made by the Norwegian government in 2014. Two main findings inform previous work. First, voters are modestly affected by party cues as the proposition turns salient. Second, when a party shifts their policy position on a highly salient issue, voters do not automatically shift their opinions accordingly. Thus, the magnitude and direction of opinion change in the electorate indicate that party cue effects are modest and that instead of polarizing patterns across time parallel publics moving in the same direction independent of party cues are detected. These findings demonstrate that under some conditions, voters’ opinion formation is less dependent on partisan elites than much of the previous work indicates.     

Who benefits from minority business set-asides? The case of New Jersey

Race-based remedies often are justified by evidence of prior discrimination. They work when they benefit groups previously disadvantaged. This article examines one such remedy—minority business set-asides—and its application in the award of public procurement and construction contracts by the state of New Jersey. Analyzed are contract awards to minority and non-minority/non-women-owned business enterprises in 1990, as well as in periods before, during, and after the imposition of a state minority set-aside program. Using a conventional decomposition approach, the article reveals significant discriminatory gaps in the success of minority- versus non-minority-owned firms in obtaining contracts from the state of New Jersey. The analysis suggests that minority contracting success rates fell from the pre-set-aside era to the set-aside era and that discriminatory outcomes persisted. The particular remedy chosen—while justified based on evidence of prior discrimination—appears not to have reduced the original discrimination nor did it unambiguously benefit minority businesses.     

Who Participates in Exit Polls?

Concerns about growing and differential nonresponse in exit polls, and the challenges introduced by mounting levels of early and mail-in voting, suggest it is important to consider the demographic and attitudinal factors associated with exit poll nonresponse. In this study, we compare the demographic and attitudinal antecedents of exit poll nonresponse between exit polls conducted at voting precincts and those conducted via telephone. We find both similarities and differences in the factors that help to explain willingness to participate in exit polls of each type.     

Who Cares? Explaining Perceptions of Compassion in Candidates for Office

Although prior research establishes the important effect perceptions of compassion have on vote choice, no systematic research examines why some candidates are perceived as more caring than others. In an era where television and social media put candidates’ personalities front and center, the lack of research on this topic is problematic. In this article, I explain why voters view some candidates as more caring than others. I argue that voters view politicians as compassionate when there is a commonality to link them. A commonality demonstrates an empathetic connection, or the ability to understand another’s feelings. This, in turn, convinces voters that the politician is sympathetic, or willing to do something to help. Without an empathetic connection, claims of sympathy by politicians will be viewed with greater levels of skepticism. I generate a classification system for the sources of commonality that link voters with politicians, including shared experiences, shared emotions, and shared identities. Using three survey experiments, I show how candidates can build empathic bonds with voters and better their chances of election.

     

The Effect of Associative Issue Ownership on Parties’ Presence in the News Media

Some studies suggest that challenger parties push new issues onto the agenda, especially when they ‘own’ these issues. Others claim that established parties largely determine how prominent issues appear on the agenda. This article contributes to this debate by focusing on an issue on which challenger parties have most ‘ownership’: immigration. Political claims on this issue made by political parties in newspapers in seven West European countries after three events that could potentially trigger attention to immigration were studied. Large and government parties appear most prominent in the news. However, findings show a significant, positive effect of associative issue ownership on claims-making in the news, while controlling for party size and government status. So, when challengers have issue ownership they appear as claim-makers on the issue. These results paint a balanced picture of the role that challenger and established parties have in setting the agenda.