Electoral and structural losers and support for a national referendum in the U.S

Electoral and structural losers and support for a national referendum in the U.S

The U.S. is one of only a few democracies in the world never to hold a national referendum. Recent national surveys reveal that a majority of respondents approve of a national referendum both cross-nationally and in America is relatively stable. Building on previous work ( Bowler and Donovan, 2007),...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Electoral studies Vol. 29; no. 3; pp. 509 - 520
Main Authors: Smith, Daniel A., Tolbert, Caroline J., Keller, Amanda M.
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier Ltd 01-09-2010
Subjects:
Ballot initiatives
Citizens
Democracy
Direct democracy
Election law
Election reform
Elections and representation
Electoral behaviour
Electoral losers
Government and politics
Legislation
Legislative Bodies
Majorities
National referendum
Panel surveys
Partisanship
Political participation
Pubic opinion
Public Opinion
Referendum
Referendums
Respondents
Strategic behaviour
U.S.A
United States
Pubic opinion
Electoral losers
National referendum
Election reform
Ballot initiatives
Direct democracy
Elections and representation
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The U.S. is one of only a few democracies in the world never to hold a national referendum. Recent national surveys reveal that a majority of respondents approve of a national referendum both cross-nationally and in America is relatively stable. Building on previous work ( Bowler and Donovan, 2007), we find public opinion on a reform proposal is fluid and responsive to electoral politics, rather than stable as reported in earlier work. In this paper, we argue that contemporary support for a national referendum in the U.S. is contingent on whether a citizen is a short- or long-term “winner” or a “loser” when it comes to electoral politics. We expect that public support for a national referendum in the U.S., where legislation referred by Congress would be subject to a popular vote, may vary at the individual level because of short-term electoral fortunes as well as long-term structural conditions. Strategic voting as well as losing in candidate races and policy issues may be important, but so might be partisanship, with non-partisans the most likely to benefit from citizen law-making at the national level. Support for a national referendum might also be contingent upon state context, that is, upon use of direct democracy in the state where a person lives, as well as the population of a state. The results based on a natural experiment and 2008 panel survey data provide an important window into understanding public opinion on institutional change more broadly.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 23
ObjectType-Article-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
ISSN:0261-3794
1873-6890
DOI:10.1016/j.electstud.2010.04.017