Collateral Consequences of a Collateral Penalty: The Negative Effect of Felon Disenfranchisement Laws on the Political Participation of Nonfelons*

Objective. Felon disenfranchisement (FD) policies are said to not only prohibit (ex)felons from voting, but also reduce the political influence of particular groups that are most affected by FD laws. This study tests several hypotheses regarding the role of socialization on individual‐level political participation to examine the claims that nonfelons' probability of voting is reduced by strict FD laws. Methods. The study uses multilevel modeling and two separate individual‐level data sets of those registered to vote to examine the effect of FD laws on the probability of voting. Results. The findings demonstrate that strict FD laws reduce the probability of voting for blacks, but not whites, while the results are mixed for several other demographic groups. Conclusions. Beyond the direct removal of ex‐felons from the voter pool, FD policy can undermine the mechanism of political socialization, leading to potentially greater biases in the electoral arena than previously thought.     

Sex and the Statehouse: The Effects of Gender on Legislative Roll‐Call Voting*

Objective. This analysis examines whether differences exist between women and men state legislators in their roll‐call voting behavior involving matters of economic and regulatory policy. Methods. Using interest group rating scores, I examine the voting behavior of representatives in the lower houses of 28 states in legislative sessions from 1995 to 2000. By controlling for a host of variables related to legislators (political party, years of service, etc.) and their districts (average income, level of education, urbanization, etc.), I am able to isolate the independent effect of gender on roll‐call voting. Results. The findings demonstrate that among Democratic legislators women are less conservative than men, but among Republican lawmakers women are slightly more conservative than men. Additional analyses show that many factors that influence legislative voting by women and men are similar; however, political party has a more prominent effect among women. Conclusion. Although factors such as political party and some constituency characteristics exert a much stronger influence than gender, women and men legislators differ in their roll‐call voting even when controls for a wide assortment of individual‐ and district‐level conditions are taken into account.     

Black Voters,Black Candidates,and Social Issues: Does Party Identification Matter?*

Objective. Much is known about voting behavior generally; less is known about voting behavior of African Americans in particular due in part to the overwhelming support of black voters for Democratic candidates. However, some argue that black conservatism on social issues could lead to more Republican voting. Methods. We test this question with a set of data on black voting behavior in a 2004 congressional race where two black candidates ran against each other. We thus hold race of candidate constant and look at the influence of social issues and party identification on black vote choice. Results. We find evidence to suggest that evangelicalism and support for the war in Iraq is related to being Republican, but that Democratic Party identification plays the dominant role in black voter decision making. Conclusions. Black conservatism on at least certain social issues is real and has the potential to influence vote choice, but the influence of Democratic Party allegiance is still a very powerful cue for black voters.     

Predictors of Children's Rights Attitudes and Psychological Well‐being Among Rural and Urban Mainland Chinese Adolescents

This study examined rural and urban Chinese adolescents’ (13–19 years, N = 395) attitudes toward children's self‐determination and nurturance rights, and how these attitudes relate to various dimensions of socialization in their family and school environments, including perceptions of parental and teacher autonomy support and responsiveness and family and school democratic climate. Relations between these variables and psychological well‐being also were examined. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that maternal responsiveness and teacher autonomy support predicted higher levels of endorsement of nurturance rights. Maternal autonomy support and tolerance of dissent at home predicted greater endorsement of self‐determination rights. Democratic climate in the home predicted higher life‐satisfaction and fewer depressive symptoms, even when parent and teacher autonomy support and responsiveness were controlled. Our findings suggest that environments that are structured more democratically and that are more responsive to children's autonomy needs are associated with higher levels of endorsement of children's rights and contribute to adolescents’ psychological health and well‐being in a non‐Western culture.     

Beyond Women,Children, and Families: Gender,Representation, and Public Funding for the Arts*

Objectives. Research on the impact of female legislators has found that in their voting records women in elective office tend to be more liberal and more supportive of issues of concern to women, children, and families than are men, differences that conform to gender stereotypes held by voters. This article examines another well‐established gender stereotype that is not linked to the traditional concerns of women as conventionally defined by scholars: that women in public office will be more supportive of the arts. Method. The 40 votes taken on arts legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives, 1983–2002, are examined using negative binomial regression in a model that includes district and personal characteristics. Results. Democratic Party membership and support, citizen ideology, urban residence, and gender are significant factors in explaining support for public funding for the arts. Female representatives are more likely than their male colleagues to support the arts, a finding that primarily reflects the greater support of Republican women for the arts in comparison with their male counterparts. Conclusion. This study suggests that substantive representation of women by female elected officials may extend to more policy issues than previous research has documented. Research on issues that are recognized as gendered (e.g., arts policy) but are not traditionally defined as women's issues is an area for further exploration.     

NIMBY opposition and solid waste incinerator siting in democratizing Taiwan

To address Taiwan's waste crisis, the Taiwanese government has embraced incinerators as a major policy instrument for waste disposal. Although the adoption of waste burning policy was not debated much, the siting of incinerators has been vigorously opposed by community-based protest movements, emerged with Taiwan's transition to democracy. In response, both the Kuomintang (KMT) government and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) government have used compensation to induce the acceptance of local hosting communities as in other countries. Nevertheless, the use of compensation has never been effective in resolving not-in-my-backyard (NIMBY) conflict without mobilizing local political and government support to suppress NIMBY protests in order to enforce the timely construction of needed incinerators. To accommodate the rising democratic expectation of public participation in deliberations over the incineration waste policy, this article also argues that the role of citizen participation must be addressed to increase public support for incinerator option in managing Taiwan's waste.     

Voting for Catholic Candidates: The Evolution of a Stereotype*

Objectives. This article looks at the effects of candidate Catholicism on individual voters, turning the traditional inquiry into voters' religion on its head. Specifically, it hypothesizes that individuals stereotype Catholic candidates based on the voting behavior of Catholics in general, and that these stereotypes help voters make a decision in elections with Catholic candidates. Methods. Using data from the American National Election Studies (ANES), this article argues that citizens hold stereotypes of Catholics based on actual Catholic political behavior—solidly Democratic from the 1950s to the 1970s, but trending Republican starting in the 1980s. It also tests these stereotypes with Gallup data on hypothetical Catholic candidates and analyzes, through election‐day exit polls, the impact on voters of the Catholic conversion of a sitting U.S. Senator. Results. The data analyses strongly support the article's hypothesis, demonstrating that partisan attitudes toward hypothetical Catholic candidates shifted direction as the Catholic electorate shifted. In addition, Senator Sam Brownback's (R‐KS) conversion to Catholicism increased partisan polarization in his support—indicating a conservative shift in perceptions. Conclusions. Candidate religion plays a role in elections. Specifically, voters stereotype candidates based on candidate religion and use this stereotyped information to help them make an electoral decision. This article demonstrates this effect for Catholicism, but other religions should evidence similar impacts.     

Calculable Power: A Case Study of IMF Quotas and Voting Rights Reform*

Voting procedure is an important mechanism for public choice in collective bodies such as international organizations. This paper measures and compares IMF member countries’ voting power before the 2008 reform and after the 2010 reform on the basis of datasets on IMF quotas and voting rights distribution provided by IMF. Our study verifies that IMF’s quotas and voting rights reforms do help to reduce the voting power gap among member countries. The 2008 and 2010 reforms produce a greater improvement in emerging members’ voting power under the 70 percent majority rule than the 85 percent rule; the 70 percent majority rule means the United States would lose its absolute veto. Moreover, the paper disproves the underlying assumption that regards a member’s voting power as proportional to its voting rights. Countries with different amounts of voting rights can still have the same voting power.     

The rising influence of evangelicalism in American political behavior, 1980–2004

Connections between evangelicalism and political behavior are explored using National Election Study (NES) data from 1980 to 2004. Our findings suggest that although white evangelical support for Republican presidential candidates has increased, the independent effect of evangelicalism on voting has weakened. We argue that this reflects an increasing convergence between evangelicalism and Republican Party identification. Beginning in the 1990s, as more and more evangelicals identified as Republicans, the independent effect of their religious commitment on voting weakened. We also find strengthening correlations between evangelicalism and policy preferences, especially on non-social issues, and enhanced Republican mobilization of evangelical voters in recent campaigns. We conclude with the suggestion that changes in evangelical political behavior over a 24-year period support the notion of an electoral realignment in American politics.     

A longitudinal test of the gender turnover model among U.S. House and Senate members

This study builds on previous research by examining the impact of gender when predicting roll call voting behavior in the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate over several recent congresses. In order to unearth gender effects, it employs a longitudinal design based on turnover in the membership of both the House and the Senate. Through a comparison of the voting records of members of Congress representing the same geographic territory it holds constituency constantly while allowing for gender and party to vary. It does so with models including dependent variables that measure roll call ideology and support for women's issues exhibited in the voting records of members in both institutions. The results show that male and female members in each chamber representing the same constituency amass virtually indistinguishable voting records on the liberal-conservative policy dimension. However, on votes dealing with issues of concern to women, female senators tend to be more supportive than the male senators they replace and male senators tend to be less supportive than the female senators they replace.     

Barack Obama's “American” Problem: Unhyphenated Americans in the 2008 Elections*

Objectives. The largest increase of any ancestry group between the 1990 and 2000 Census in the United States were “unhyphenated Americans,” those whites who claimed an “American” or no ancestry. This article measures this group's voting habits in the 2008 elections. Methods. With individual‐level attitudinal data and county‐level voting data from the 2008 primary and 2000–2008 general elections, the analyses use quantitative methods to estimate unhyphenated Americans' voting behavior. Results. Evidence indicates a strong rejection of Obama among counties with high proportions of unhyphenated Americans in both the 2008 primary and general elections. Conclusion. While spatially concentrated in and near Appalachia, unhyphenated Americans' politics are distinctive irrespective of socioeconomic status, religion, and geography, being one of the few groups in which Barack Obama lost votes compared to previous Democratic nominees. Variation in the share of unhyphenated Americans explains more of the difference between 2008 and past elections than variation in the share of African Americans per county.     

The Impact of Presidential Speeches on the Bureaucracy*

Objective. Scholars have long held that presidents use various tools to control the federal bureaucracy. Yet, despite their importance to presidents in achieving their policy goals in Congress, few scholars have examined the impact of presidential speeches on bureaucratic activity. This article analyzes the impact of both positive and negative policy signals on civil rights policy in the bureaucracy. Method. I test this hypothesis using speeches coded from the Public Papers of the Presidents and their impact on criminal cases filed by the Civil Rights Division over time. Given heteroskedasticity in the dependent variable, log‐linear time‐series methods are appropriate. Results. The president's positive speeches increase the number of criminal civil rights cases filed in U.S. District Court. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 also has had a significant, positive impact on bureaucratic activity. Conclusions. In part because bureaucrats have discretion to resist presidential preferences that oppose an agency's core task, negative signals do not affect the implementation of civil rights policy. Yet, positive presidential speeches are available to presidents who may wish to influence the bureaucracy.     

Government for the people: the substantive elements of democracy

The most widely used understandings of the concept of democracy – normative, procedural and institutional – focus on its methods and approaches. This article argues that democracy needs also to be understood in terms of its substantive implications. Democratic rights include not only the civil and political rights associated with liberal democracy, but also the economic and social rights promoted in industrially developed countries. Liberal principles promote democracy and economic development. Social rights have developed, not just through state action, but through the independent establishment of solidarities facilitated by the exercise of democratic rights. Every established democracy has a system of social welfare provision. This is not coincidental. Democracy, economic development and social protection are intimately linked.     

Southern Political Exceptionalism? Presidential Voting in the South and Non‐South*

Objective. This study develops and tests a model of political regionalism that posits that if regions are politically exceptional, then individuals sharing the same profile but living in these different regions will have divergent presidential voting patterns ( King, 1996 ). Methods. Analyzing presidential voting behavior from 1952 to 2004, I use logistic regression techniques to test a regional model of homogeneity (southern exceptionalism) versus a unit model of homogeneity (South and Non‐South are statistically similar). Results. The findings show that the South's presidential voting patterns are exceptional in the 1950s and during the civil rights era but, starting in the Reagan era, southern exceptionalism waned. These findings also show that the South is converging with the non‐South (northernization) relative to the influences of race, family income, union membership, in‐migrants, and gender, and the non‐South is converging with the South (southernization) relative to the influences of education, blue‐collar workers, and age. Conclusions. Both economic class and race variables contribute to the demise of regional exceptionalism; however, race plays a more persistent role. Given the process of “southernization” and the instability of the predictors of presidential voting for the South over time, I conclude that the study of the South as a region should continue until the process of change subsides and a new equilibrium is found.     

Electoral Support for Community Growth Management Policy*

Objectives. This study seeks to explain the variation in voter support for growth management policy. Interest group theory of local politics and property rights is used as a theoretical framework to explore how competing pro‐growth and anti‐growth interests influence the level of electoral support at the ballot box. Methods. Survey data collected from local planning officials in Massachusetts are analyzed using a two‐stage Heckman selection model. Results. The results indicate that development competition has a negative effect and controversy over development a positive effect on the probability of a community placing growth management policy on the local ballot. The analysis further indicates that environmental interests and suburban communities have a positive influence on the percentage of votes cast in favor of conservation‐oriented growth management policy. Neighborhood‐based interests, on the other hand, have a negative influence on voter support. Conclusions. The findings suggest that compared to the normal legislative process, ballot‐box voting allows anti‐growth and localized interests the opportunity to craft proposals and then mobilize support for policy changes.     

The influence of socio-economic characteristics on the political attitudes of American Indians

We examine the political attitudes of American Indians in eastern Oklahoma where they make up almost 20% of the population. We argue that American Indians in the region play the same role that other minorities in the southern states—notably blacks and Hispanics—do in resisting the region's realignment from the Democratic to the Republican Party. American Indians in the region are populists in that they are economically liberal and religiously conservative. The results of our analysis suggest that the socio-economic characteristics of American Indians play a greater role in explaining American Indians’ political attitudes than their ethnic identification.     

Candidates and Competition: Variability in Ideological Voting in U.S. Senate Elections*

Objectives. In choosing candidates to support in congressional elections, voters consider both policy and nonpolicy factors. However, the relative importance of incumbency or presidential approval versus candidates' ideological platforms likely varies across elections. Specifically, stiffer electoral competition should encourage ideology‐based voting because candidate information is more plentiful. In contrast, incumbents' ability to garner votes simply by virtue of already holding office should depress proximity voting in elections with incumbents. Methods. Using data from the 1988–1992 Pooled Senate Election Study, I estimate logistic regression models of individual vote choice. Results. I find that open‐seat elections do promote the use of candidate ideological proximity in the voting calculus but that the effects of election competitiveness are less clear. Conclusions. The findings have important implications for normative democratic theory, for our constitutional framework, and for elite behavior and aggregate‐level electoral outcomes.     

Political Threat and Immigration: Party Identification,Demographic Context,and Immigration Policy Preference*

Objective. I propose that the effect of partisanship on views on immigration is context dependent. I argue that Republicans in counties experiencing high levels of immigration are more likely to support new immigration restrictions in contrast to Democrats and Independents than Republicans in counties with a relatively small foreign‐born population, and I suspect this is the case because Republicans in high‐immigration counties feel politically threatened by the foreign‐born residents, who are more likely to support Democratic candidates. Method. To test this theory, I create hierarchical logit models of views on immigration policy in which individual party identification interacts with the size of the local immigrant population. Individual‐level data were drawn from the 2004 National Annenberg Election Survey and county‐level contextual variables from the U.S. Census Bureau. Results. I find that the effect of partisanship on individual views on immigration is context dependent; native‐born Republicans are more likely to support immigration restrictions when their local community has a large immigrant population and Democrats less likely. Conclusion. In areas where immigration levels are low, partisanship is a weak predictor of immigration views. As the foreign‐born population increases, however, the views of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents increasingly diverge.     

Population ecology and niche seeking in the development of gay and lesbian rights groups

This paper explores the formation of groups within the framework of the population ecology literature. Specifically, I argue that newly formed groups’ target membership bases and policy agendas will become more focused as the density of interest groups in a population increases, though groups will not necessarily continue this focused trend once the density of the population has reached its upper limits. To test this theory, I utilize Nownes’ [Nownes, A. J. (2004). The population ecology of interest group formation: Mobilizing for gay and lesbian rights in the United States, 1950–1998. British Journal of Political Science, 34, 49–67] dataset on the population ecology of gay and lesbian rights groups and a typology of groups that Bosso [Bosso, C. J. (2005). Environment, Inc.: From Grassroots to Beltway. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas] used in explaining the focus of environmental rights groups. I find that as the population of gay and lesbian groups became more dense, the groups that formed tended to narrow down their potential membership populations. However, the results were different for a newly formed group's policy agenda. While niche seeking occurred during the rapid growth of groups in the 1970s and the early 1980s, groups that formed after growth leveled off in the mid-1980s balanced their agendas between being too broad and too narrow. This important finding indicates that niche seeking does not always occur in very dense interest populations.     

Losing to nobody? Nevada's “none of these candidates” ballot reform

Since 1975, Nevada voters have had the option of voting for “none of these candidates” in all statewide elections—a reform that one-third of the American states have since considered copying. It remains unclear, however, what effects this reform has had. By testing several arguments made by proponents and opponents of this reform, I find, first, that voters who actually choose “none of these” are motivated by a mixture of ignorance and protest; second, that most voters who choose “none” would probably have left parts of their ballot blank in the absence of the “none” option; and third, that “none” does not drain votes from third-party candidates, as some have feared.