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Mobilize for Our Lives? School Shootings and Democratic Accountability in U.S. Elections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 August 2020

HANS J. G. HASSELL Open the ORCID record for HANS J. G. HASSELL [Opens in a new window] ,
JOHN B. HOLBEIN Open the ORCID record for JOHN B. HOLBEIN [Opens in a new window]  and
MATTHEW BALDWIN
HANS J. G. HASSELL*
Affiliation:
Florida State University
JOHN B. HOLBEIN*
Affiliation:
University of Virginia
MATTHEW BALDWIN*
Affiliation:
Brigham Young University
*
Hans J. G. Hassell, Associate Professor of Political Science, Department of Political Science, Florida State University, hans.hassell@fsu.edu.
John B. Holbein, Assistant Professor of Public Policy, Politics and Education, Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy, University of Virginia, holbein@virginia.edu.
Matthew Baldwin, B.A. Student, Department of Political Science, Brigham Young University, littlebaldwin@gmail.com.
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Abstract

Gun violence is a large and growing problem in the United States. Many reformers look towards elections to spur policy change in this area. In this paper, we explore the effects of school shootings on electoral mobilization and election outcomes. We pair data from several sources that measure validated voter registration; validated voter turnout; and the electoral performance of officials at the local, state, and federal levels with regression discontinuity and panel methods. Our effects show that shootings have little to no effect on electoral outcomes in the United States. Our work demonstrates that even when tragic events occur that are squarely in the realm of elected officials’ responsibility, have high levels of issue salience, are highly-covered by the media, draw citizens’ attention, and (perhaps) shift public opinion, these seemingly favorable conditions may not be enough to elicit democratic accountability.

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Type
Letter
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American Political Science Review , Volume 114 , Issue 4 , November 2020 , pp. 1375 - 1385
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Political Science Association

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Footnotes

We wish to thank the Data Trust for sharing access to their data and to Matt Easton, Chase Fowers, Brittany Bair, Drew Brown, and Madeline Beck for their research assistance. We also wish to thank the National Science Foundation (SES-1657821) for funding this project. We are grateful to Jack Beaumaster, Delton Daigle, Bradley Jones, Cecillia Mo, Judith Torney-Purta, Dan Smith, and Michael Herron and audiences at Brigham Young University, the University of Virginia, as well as and the 2019 MPSA and APSA conferences for feedback on this paper. Replication files are available at the American Political Science Review Dataverse: https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/YF761K.

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