Skip to main content

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
Cancel
×
Home
Article
    • Aa
    • Aa
  • Cited by 120
  • Cited by
    Crossref Citations
    Crossref logo
    This article has been cited by the following publications. This list is generated based on data provided by CrossRef.

    Martin, George M. 2017. Views on the ethical struggle for universal, high quality, affordable health care and its relevance for gerontology. Experimental Gerontology, Vol. 87, p. 182.

    Plessing, Julia 2017. Challenging Elite Understandings of Citizen Participation in South Africa. Politikon, p. 1.

    Rockman, Bert A. 2017. The melting down of government: A multidecade perspective. Governance, Vol. 30, Issue. 1, p. 29.

    Albertus, Michael and Menaldo, Victor 2016. Capital in the Twenty-First Century—in the Rest of the World. Annual Review of Political Science, Vol. 19, Issue. 1, p. 49.

    Anand, Divya 2016. Ecodocumentaries.

    Anderson, Bret Krueger, Brian S. and Xu, Ping 2016. Does Global Market Integration Weaken Opinion-Policy Congruence in the American States?. Politics & Policy, Vol. 44, Issue. 4, p. 677.

    Baiman, Ron P. 2016. The Morality of Radical Economics.

    Bainbridge, William Sims 2016. Wireless Computing in Medicine.

    Baum, Bruce 2016. The Post-Liberal Imagination.

    Bishop, Matthew Louis 2016. The Palgrave Handbook of International Development.

    Broockman, David E. 2016. Approaches to Studying Policy Representation. Legislative Studies Quarterly, Vol. 41, Issue. 1, p. 181.

    Butler, Daniel M. and Dynes, Adam M. 2016. How Politicians Discount the Opinions of Constituents with Whom They Disagree. American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 60, Issue. 4, p. 975.

    Catlaw, Thomas J. and Stout, Margaret 2016. Governing Small-Town America Today: The Promise and Dilemma of Dense Networks. Public Administration Review, Vol. 76, Issue. 2, p. 225.

    Chaufan, Claudia 2016. What Can US Single-Payer Supporters Learn From the Swiss Rejection of Single Payer?. International Journal of Health Services, Vol. 46, Issue. 2, p. 331.

    Chouinard, Hayley H. Galinato, Gregmar I. and Wandschneider, Philip R. 2016. MAKING FRIENDS TO INFLUENCE OTHERS: ENTRY AND CONTRIBUTION DECISIONS THAT AFFECT SOCIAL CAPITAL IN AN ASSOCIATION. Economic Inquiry, Vol. 54, Issue. 2, p. 819.

    Elmedni, Bakry 2016. Death of Rationality: The Social Networks’ Factor in Policy Response to Ebola. International Journal of Public Administration, Vol. 39, Issue. 12, p. 917.

    Flavin, Patrick and Hartney, Michael T. 2016. Racial Inequality in Democratic Accountability: Evidence from Retrospective Voting in Local Elections. American Journal of Political Science,

    Flavin, Patrick 2016. Labor Union Strength and the Equality of Political Representation. British Journal of Political Science, p. 1.

    Flavin, Patrick and Shufeldt, Gregory 2016. Party competition and citizens' political attitudes in the American states. Electoral Studies, Vol. 44, p. 235.

    Flavin, Patrick and Franko, William W. 2016. Government's Unequal Attentiveness to Citizens' Political Priorities. Policy Studies Journal,

    Download full list
    ×
  • Access

Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens

Abstract

Each of four theoretical traditions in the study of American politics—which can be characterized as theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy, Economic-Elite Domination, and two types of interest-group pluralism, Majoritarian Pluralism and Biased Pluralism—offers different predictions about which sets of actors have how much influence over public policy: average citizens; economic elites; and organized interest groups, mass-based or business-oriented.

A great deal of empirical research speaks to the policy influence of one or another set of actors, but until recently it has not been possible to test these contrasting theoretical predictions against each other within a single statistical model. We report on an effort to do so, using a unique data set that includes measures of the key variables for 1,779 policy issues.

Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence. The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.

  • View HTML
      • Send article to Kindle

      To send this article to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about sending to your Kindle.

      Note you can select to send to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be sent to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

      Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

      Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens
      Available formats
      ×
      Send article to Dropbox

      To send this article to your Dropbox account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your Dropbox account. Find out more about sending content to Dropbox.

      Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens
      Available formats
      ×
      Send article to Google Drive

      To send this article to your Google Drive account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your Google Drive account. Find out more about sending content to Google Drive.

      Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens
      Available formats
      ×
Copyright
COPYRIGHT: © American Political Science Association 2014 
Linked references
Hide All

This list contains references from the content that can be linked to their source. For a full set of references and notes please see the PDF or HTML where available.

Frank R. Baumgartner , Jeffrey M. Berry , Marie Hojnacki , David C. Kimball , and Beth L. Leech . 2009. Lobbying and Policy Change: Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Duncan Black . 1948. “On the Rationale of Group Decision-making.” Journal of Political Economy 56: 23–34.
Brandice Canes-Wrone , Michael C. Herron , and Kenneth W. Shotts . 2001. “Leadership and Pandering: A Theory of Executive Policymaking.” American Journal of Political Science 45: 532–50.
Alexander Hamilton , James Madison , and John Jay . 1961 [1787–88]. The Federalist Papers, ed. Clinton Rossiter . New York: New American Library.
Harold Hotelling . 1929. “Stability in Competition.” Economic Journal 39: 41–57.
Jeffrey Isaac . 1987a. “Beyond the Three Faces of Power: A Realist Critique.” Polity 20(1): 4–31.
Larry R. Jacobs , and Benjamin I. Page . 2005. “Who Influences U.S. Foreign Policy?” American Political Science Review 99(1): 107–23.
Kenneth O May . 1952. “A Set of Independent Necessary and Sufficient Conditions for Simple Majority Decisions.” Econometrica 20: 680–84.
Richard McKelvey . 1976. “ Intransitivities in Multidimensional Voting Models and Some Implications for Agenda Control.” Journal of Economic Theory 12: 472–82.
Alan D Monroe . 1979. “Consistency between Public Preferences and National Policy Decisions.” American Politics Quarterly 7: 3–18.
Benjamin I. Page , and Lawrence R. Jacobs . 2009. Class War? What Americans Really Think about Economic Inequality. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Benjamin I Page . 1992. The Rational Public: Fifty Years of Trends in Americans’ Policy Preferences. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Adam Przeworksi , and Michael Wallerstein . 1982. “The Structure of Class Conflict in Democratic Capitalist Societies.” American Political Science Review 76(2): 215–38.
Theda Skocpol , and Kenneth Finegold . 1982. “State Capacity and Economic Intervention in the Early New Deal.” Political Science Quarterly 97: 255–78.
Mark A Smith . 2000. American Business and Political Power: Public Opinion, Elections, and Democracy. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
George J Stigler . 1971. “The Theory of Economic Regulation.” The Bell Journal of Economics and Management Science 2(1): 3–21.
Alexis de Tocqueville . 2000 [1835–1840]. Democracy in America. Trans. and ed. Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop . Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Jeffrey A Winters . 2011. Oligarchy. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Recommend this journal

Email your librarian or administrator to recommend adding this journal to your organisation's collection.

Perspectives on Politics
  • ISSN: 1537-5927
  • EISSN: 1541-0986
  • URL: /core/journals/perspectives-on-politics
Please enter your name
Please enter a valid email address
Who would you like to send this to? *

CAPTCHA *

Skip to the audio challenge
×
Type Description Title
WORD
Supplementary Materials

Gilens Supplementary Material
Gilens Supplementary Material 1

 Word (78 KB)
78 KB
WORD
Supplementary Materials

Gilens Supplementary Material
Gilens Supplementary Material 2

 Word (39 KB)
39 KB
PDF
Supplementary Materials

Gilens Supplementary Material
Gilens Supplementary Material 5

 PDF (36 KB)
36 KB
UNKNOWN
Supplementary Materials

Gilens Supplementary Material
Gilens Supplementary Material 6

 Unknown (4.4 MB)
4.4 MB
PDF
Supplementary Materials

Gilens Supplementary Material
Gilens Supplementary Material 4

 PDF (16 KB)
16 KB
PDF
Supplementary Materials

Gilens Supplementary Material
Gilens Supplementary Material 3

 PDF (38 KB)
38 KB

Metrics

Altmetric attention score

Full text views

Total number of HTML views: 23705
Total number of PDF views: 20015 *
Loading metrics...

Abstract views

Total abstract views: 157775 *
Loading metrics...

* Views captured on Cambridge Core between September 2016 - 23rd August 2017. This data will be updated every 24 hours.

Cancel
Confirm
×