How do political conditions influence whether public support develops for a new policy? Specifically, does the presence of partisan polarization and a viable threat to a policy’s continuation prevent the emergence of such support? We propose a theoretical framework that considers how policy feedback may be affected by the presence or absence of both policy threat and polarization. We argue that a threat is likely to increase policy salience and trigger loss aversion, expanding policy feedback even amid strong partisanship. We examine the threat to the Affordable Care Act after Republicans won control of Congress and the White House and stood poised to act on their long promise to repeal the law. Five waves of panel data permit analysis of how individuals’ responses to the law changed over time, affecting their support for it as well as their voting calculations. The results suggest that policy threat heightens the effect of policy feedback for some populations while depressing it for others, in some cases mitigating partisan polarization, and overall boosting program support.

Following E. E. Schattschneider’s observation that “a new policy creates a new politics,” scholars of “policy feedback” have theorized that policies influence subsequent political behavior and public opinion. Recent studies observe, however, that policy feedback does not always occur and the form it takes varies considerably. To explain such variation, we call for policy feedback studies to draw more thoroughly on public opinion research. We theorize that: (1) feedback effects are not ubiquitous and may in some instances be offset by political factors, such as partisanship and trust in government; (2) policy design may generate self-interested or sociotropic motivations, and (3) feedback effects result not only from policy benefits but also from burdens. We test these expectations by drawing on a unique panel study of Americans’ responses to the Affordable Care Act. We find competing policy and political pathways, which produce variations in policy feedback.

The Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA) is a landmark in American social policy that is disrupting America’s “liberal tradition.” It is successfully expanding access and compelling insurers to change their business models to serve more socially-useful purposes; cost control enjoyed initial success but confronts barriers rooted in America’s resilient political economy. The ACA is disrupting long-standing patterns of American politics, introducing new developmental paths that unsettle or, in certain respects, offset the familiar patterns of selectivity, deference to private markets, and “drift” that tend to produce government inaction as economic insecurity increases. New policy arrangements for financing and delivering medical care is ushering in a new politics of US health care that are resetting the terms of future debate; the ACA is also challenging familiar approaches to studying politics including analyses of framing, policy effects and political development, and American political thought.

The tumultuous journey of health reform from President Barack Obama's opening push in February 2009 to his bill signing in March 2010 may be inexplicable from afar. Swept into power on promises of change, Democrats controlled the White House and enjoyed the largest Congressional majorities in decades, and they agreed that the existing health care system cost too much and delivered too little—stranding over 30 million with no health insurance and leaving millions more with only inadequate coverage or dependent on emergency rooms for urgent care. Unified party control and programmatic agreement would seem like a veritable checklist of what was needed to pass health reform legislation.

President Obama's record stands out among modern presidents because of the wide range between his accomplishments and the boldness of his as-yet unfulfilled promises. Obamaism is a complex phenomenon, with multiple themes and policy ends. In this paper we examine the administration's initiatives drawing upon recent scholarship in political science to consider the political, economic and institutional constraints that Obama has faced and to assess how he has faced them. Our key theme is the importance of integrating the study of presidency and public leadership with the study of the political economy of the state. The paper argues against personalistic accounts of the Obama presidency in favor of a structured agency approach.

Can public trust in government be increased by expanding knowledge of the activities government already performs? This study takes advantage of a naturally occurring experiment—the distribution of personal statements by the Social Security Administration— to examine the impact of increased domain-specific information on the public’s knowledge and confidence. Analysis of a large Gallup survey of attitudes toward Social Security finds that recipients of personal Social Security Statements gained more knowledge of, and confidence in, Social Security than nonrecipients after controlling for individual differences. These results suggest that citizens’ evaluations of government institutions echo, in part, the quality and quantity of information distributed to them. The implication for future research on political trust and confidence is to confirm the importance of expanding analysis from global to specific objects of evaluation.

American society has witnessed an extraordinary widening of economic inequality in the period since World War II that is unmatched among advanced industrialized countries. In 2003, the most affluent fifth received 47.6% of family income, the middle class (the third and fourth fifths) earned 15.5% and 23.3%, respectively, while the bottom two quintiles each received less than 10%. (Twenty-one percent of family income went to the top 5%.) In other words, the richest 20% obtained nearly half of the country's income. That income (and wealth) is unevenly distributed is neither new nor necessarily disturbing. What is remarkable is the large and unmistakable increase in the concentration of income at the top (Mishel, Bernstein, and Allegretto 2005).

Research in international relations has identified a variety of actors who appear to influence U.S. foreign policy, including experts and “epistemic communities,” organized interests (especially business and labor), and ordinary citizens or “public opinion.” This research, however, has often focused on a single factor at a time, rather than systematically testing the relative importance of alternative possible influences. Using extensive survey data gathered over three decades we conduct a comparative test, attempting to account for the expressed foreign policy preferences of policy makers by means of the preferences of the general public and those of several distinct sets of elites. The results of cross-sectional and time-lagged analyses suggest that U.S. foreign policy is most heavily and consistently influenced by internationally oriented business leaders, followed by experts (who, however, may themselves be influenced by business). Labor appears to have significant but smaller impacts. The general public seems to have considerably less effect, except under particular conditions. These results generally hold over several different analytical models (including two-observation time series) and different clusters of issues (economic, military, and diplomatic), with some variations across different institutional settings (the U.S. House, Senate, and executive branch).

A burgeoning literature shows that campaigns exert substantial influence on voters by priming selected policy issues. We extend this research by offering a framework that (1) incorporates a model of campaign image priming and (2) describes the political conditions that shape campaign priming strategies. We test our framework in the context of Richard Nixon's 1972 presidential campaign. Using internal campaign memoranda, Nixon's private public opinion polls, and a comprehensive content analysis of Nixon's public statements, we find that Nixon engaged in both issue and image priming. Specifically, White House polling reports of strong public support for particular domestic policy positions prompted Nixon subsequently to prime those issues and positions. Moreover, poll reports of negative evaluations of his personality traits led Nixon to emphasize foreign policy issues so as to convey an impression of his competence and strength. We conclude that candidates tailor issue and image priming strategies to the parameters of public opinion and the strategic opportunities offered by the political conditions of their time.

Health care reform is an important issue in the 2004 presidential elections and is receiving serious attention from the Democratic and Republican candidates. Changes in the economy that fuelled increased productivity and depressed job growth have also shifted more of the costs of medical care and insurance onto employees. The rising costs of insurance premiums and health care are far outpacing the general inflation rate and workers’ wages. Meanwhile, state governments reacted to widening budget deficits from 2001 to 2003 by reducing Medicaid eligibility and benefits. These changes in employer-based health insurance and government policy have contributed to the largest rise in the share of Americans without health insurance in a decade. In 2002, the uninsured numbered 43.6 million and, according to the Congressional Budget Office, 57 to 59 million non-elderly people are uninsured at some point over the course of a year.

Along with the need for heightened skills in managing huge amounts of information, the use of new electronic resources requires its own caution: researchers should not allow the ease of information gathering to tempt them to rely exclusively on these electronic sources. The rapidly growing online data and information are at best incomplete and at worst inaccurate. Despite potential problems, researchers can minimize the ill effects of on-line sources and ultimately benefit tremendously from their use. The speed and easy access of these sources enable researchers to gather enormous amounts of information quickly and to conduct far more comprehensive searches for particular types of materials than is feasible or even possible by more traditional means.

Drawing on our experience gathering White House communications regarding health care during the 103rd Congress, we offer some advice and warnings about electronic document gathering. Because of the variations in software and changes in communications technology, however, we do not provide here a step-by-step on-line user's manual. Rather, we offer some technical pointers in accessing the on-line archives.