No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Public issues or issue publics? The distribution of genuine political attitudes
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 July 2018
Abstract
There is an inherent conflict between the political marketing model of humans and pioneering theories in electoral behavior research. While political marketing logic implies an issue-based and highly volatile voting behavior, voting theories conventionally assume that positional issues have little effect on how individuals vote, and so parties have little incentive to develop issue-based electoral strategies. However, few people would challenge the role that marketing now plays in the modern campaign process. How can we reconcile these theories? This paper revisits the role and impact of positional issues on voting behavior by testing whether specific issues affect different subgroups of voters as contended by the ‘issue-public’ theory. The results show that previous models underestimate issue voting. Once measurement accuracy is improved and the salience-based heterogeneity of issue effects is taken into consideration, positional issues have non-negligible effects on individual vote choice. Furthermore, salience-based heterogeneity is shown to explain better the variation in issue voting than heterogeneity based on political sophistication.
- Type
- Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018
References
Althaus, S. L. (2003), Collective Preferences in Democratic Politics: Opinion Surveys and the Will of the People, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ansolabehere, S., Rodden, J. and Snyder, J. M. Jr. (2008, May), ‘The strength of issues: Using multiple measures to gauge preference stability, ideological constraint, and issue voting’, American Political Science Review, 102(2): 215–232.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baines, P. R., Brennan, R. and Egan, J.. (2003), ‘Market Classification and Political Campaigning’, Journal of Political Marketing, 2(2): 47–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bartle, J. (2005). ‘Homogeneous models and heterogeneous voters’, Political Studies, 53, 653–675.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bartle, J. and Griffiths, D.. (2002), ‘Social-Psychological, Economic and Marketing Models of Voting Behaviour Compared’, in The Idea of Political Marketing, ed. Henneberg, Stephen C. M. and O'Shaughnessy, Nicholas J., Westport. CT: Praeger pp. 19–37.Google Scholar
Baum, M. A. (2002), ‘Sex, lies and war: How soft news brings foreign policy to the inattentive public’, American Political Science Review, 96(1): 91–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berelson, B. R., Lazarsfeld, P. F. and McPhee, W. N.. (1954), Voting: A Study of Opinion Formation in a Presidential Campaign, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Blais, A., Gidengil, E., Nadeau, R. and Nevitte, N.. (2002), Anatomy of a Liberal Victory, Peterborough: Broadview Press.Google Scholar
Bolsen, T. and Leeper, T. J.. (2013), ‘Self-Interest and Attention to News among Issue Publics’, Political Communication, 30(3): 329–348.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, A., Converse, P. E., Miller, W. and Stokes, D. (1960), The American Voter, New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Clarke, H. D., Kornberg, A. and Scotto, T. J.. (2008), Making Political Choices: Canada and the United States, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Converse, P. E. (1964), ‘The nature of belief systems in mass publics’, in Apter, D. (ed.), Ideology and Discontent, New-York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Converse, P. E. (1970), ‘Attitudes and non-attitudes: Continuation of a dialogue’, in Tufte, E. R. (ed.), The Quantitative Analysis of Social Problems, pp. 168–189. Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Cwalina, W., Falkowski, A. and Newman, B. I.. (2011), Political Marketing: Theoretical and Strategic Foundations, New York: M.E Sharpe.Google Scholar
Dalton, Russell J. (1988), Citizen Politics in Western Democracies: Public Opinion and Political Parties in the United States, Great Britain, West Germany, and France, Chatham: Chatham.Google Scholar
Dalton, Russel J. (2012), The Apartisan American: Dealignment and the Transformation of Electoral Politics, Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Damore, D. F. (2004), ‘The dynamics of issue ownership in presidential campaigns’, Political Research Quarterly, 57(3): 391–397.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Delli Carpini, M. X. and Keeter, S. (1993). ‘Measuring political knowledge: Putting first things first’, American Journal of Political Science, 37(4): 1179–1206.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Delli Carpini, M. X. and Keeter, S. (1996), What Americans Know about Politics and Why it Matters, New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Druckman, J. N. (2014), ‘Pathologies of Studying Public Opinion, Political Communication, and Democratic Responsiveness’, Political Communication, 31, 467–492.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Enelow, James M. and Melvin, Hinich J.. (1984), The Spatial Theory of Voting: An Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Erbring, L., Goldenberg, E., and Miller, A. (1980), ‘Front-page news and real-world cues: A new look at agenda-setting’, American Journal of Political Science, 24: 16–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franklin, M. N., Mackie, T. T., and Valen, H. (eds.) (1992), Electoral Change: Responses to Evolving Social and Attitudinal Structures in Western Countries, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gidengil, E. (1992), ‘Canada votes: A quarter century of Canadian national election studies’, Canadian Journal of Political Science, 25(2): 219–248.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gidengil, E., Nevitte, N., Blais, A., Everitt, J., and Fournier, P.. (2012), Dominance and Decline: Making Sense of Recent Canadian Elections, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Goren, P. (1997), ‘Political expertise and issue voting in presidential elections’, Political Research Quarterly, 50: 387–412.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henderson, M. (2014), ‘Issue Publics, Campaigns, and Political Knowledge’, Political Behavior, 36(3): 631–657.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Highton, B. (2009). ‘Revisiting the relationship between educational attainment and political sophistication’, Journal of Politics 71(4): 1564–1576.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hillygus, S. D. and Shields, T.. (2008). The Persuadable Voter: Wedge Issues in Presidential Campaigns, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huckfeldt, R. and Sprague, J. (1995), Citizens, Politics, and Social Communication: Information and Influence in an Election Campaign, New-York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Iyengar, S., Hahn, K. S., Krosnick, J. A. and Walker, J. (2008), ‘Selective exposure to campaign communication: The role of anticipated agreement and issue public membership’, Journal of Politics, 70(1): 186–200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Iyengar, S. and Kinder, D. R. (1987), News That Matters: Television and American Opinion, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Kim, Y. M. (2007), ‘How Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations Interact in Selectivity: Investigating the Moderating Effects of Situational Information Processing Goals in Issue Publics’ Web Behavior’, Communication Research, 34(2): 185–211.Google Scholar
Kotler, P. (1984), Marketing Management: Analysis, Planning and Control, 5th edition, London: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Krosnick, J. A. (1990), ‘Government policy and citizen passion: A study of issue publics in contemporary America’, Political Behavior, 12: 59–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuklinski, J. H. and Peyton, B. (2007), ‘Belief systems and political decision making’, in Dalton, R. J. and Klingemann, H.-D. (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Political Behavior, pp. 45–64. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kuklinski, J. H. and Segura, G. M. (1995), ‘Endogeneity, exogeneity, time, and space in political representation: A review article’, Legislative Studies Quarterly, 20(1): 3–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kwak, N. (1999), ‘Revisiting the knowledge gap hypothesis: Education, motivation, and media use’, Communication Research, 26(4): 385–413.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lau, R. R. and Redlawsk, D. P.. ‘Voting Correctly’, The American Political Science Review, 91(3): 585–598.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lazarsfeld, P. N., Berelson, B. R. and Gaudet, H.. (1948), The People's Choice: How the Voter Makes up Their Mind in a Presidential Campaign, New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Lees-Marshment, J. (2008), ‘Political Marketing: How to Reach That Pot of Gold’, Journal of Political Marketing, 2(1): 1–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis-Beck, M., Jacoby, W. G., Norpoth, H., and Weisberg, H. F. (2008), The American Voter Revisited, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Luskin, R. C. (1987), ‘Measuring political sophistication’. American Journal of Political Science, 31(4): 856–899.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Luskin, R. C. (1990), ‘Explaining political sophistication’, Political Behavior, 12(4): 331–361.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McGinnis, J. (1968), The Selling of the President 1968, London: Andre Deutsch Limited.Google Scholar
Nadeau, R., Nevitte, N., Gidengil, E., and Blais, A. (2008), ‘Election campaigns as information campaigns: Who learns what and does it matter?’ Political Communication, (25): 229–248.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neuman, W. R. (1986), The Paradox of Mass Politics: Knowledge and Opinion in the American Electorate, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
O'Shaughnessy, N. J. (1990), The Phenomenon of Political Marketing, Basingstoke: Macmillan Publishers.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Petrocik, J. R. (1996), ‘Issue ownership in presidential elections, with a 1980 case study’, American Journal of Political Science, 40(3): 825–850.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plasser, F. and Plasser, G.. (2002), Global Political Campaigning: A Worldwide Analysis of Campaign Professionals and Their Practices, Westport, CT: Praeger.Google Scholar
Popkin, S. L. (1991), The Reasoning Voter: Communication and Persuasion in Presidential Campaigns (2nd ed.). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
RePass, D. E. (1971), ‘Issue salience and party choice’, American Political Science Review, 65(2): 389–400.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rivers, D. (1988), ‘Heterogeneity in models of electoral choice’, American Journal of Political Science, 32: 737–757.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roy, J. (2009), ‘Voter heterogeneity: Informational differences and voting’, Canadian Journal of Political Science, 42(1): 117–137.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scheufele, D. A. (2000), ‘Agenda-setting, priming, and framing revisited: another look at cognitive effects of political communication’, Mass Communication & Society, 3(2/3), 297–316.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sniderman, P. M., Brody, R. A., and Tetlock, P. E.. (1991), Reasoning and Choice: Explorations in Political Psychology, New-York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Strömbäck, J. (2008), ‘Political Marketing and Professionalized Campaigning: A Conceptual Analysis’, Journal of Political Marketing, 6(2–3): 49–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stroud, N. J. (2008), ‘Media use and political predispositions: Revisiting the concept of selective exposure’, Political Behavior, 30(3): 341–366.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vavreck, L. (2009), The Message Matters: The Economy and Presidential Campaigns, Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wlezien, C. (2005), ‘On the salience of political issues: The problem with the ‘most important problem’’, Electoral Studies, 24: 555–579.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zaller, J. R. (1990), ‘Political awareness, elite opinion leadership, and the mass survey response’, Social Cognition, 8: 125–153.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zaller, J. R. (1992), The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion, New-York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zaller, J. R. (1998, June), ‘Monica Lewinsky's contribution to political science’, PS: Political Science & Politics 31(2): 182–189.Google Scholar