Blame, Responsibility, and the Tea Party in the 2010 Midterm Elections

Aldrich, John H.; Bishop, Bradford H.; Hatch, Rebecca; Hillygus, D. Sunshine; Rohde, David W.

doi:10.1007/s11109-013-9242-4

Cited by 12 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…Indeed, explanations for incidents appear consistent with patterns observed after other salient events and circumstances including mass shootings, disaster responses, civil unrest, high gas prices, and a struggling economy (Aldrich, Bishop, Hatch, Hillygus, & Rohde, 2014;Atkeson & Maestas, 2012;Fasel, Sarrasin, Green, & Mayor, 2016;Gomez & Wilson, 2003;Klein & Kantor, 2017;Merry, 2013;Rudolph, 2003aRudolph, , 2003bRudolph, , 2006Wagner, 2014). Observers struggling to understand events are often plagued by uncertainty.…”

mentioning

confidence: 69%

Bad Apples? Attributions for Police Treatment of African Americans

Haider‐Markel

Joslyn

2017

Anal Soc Iss & Public Policy

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Numerous recent encounters between police officers and Black citizens have resulted in the deaths of African American men and have drawn renewed public scrutiny of police practices. We examine the public's attributions about these encounters. Does the public perceive violent confrontations between police officers and Black citizens as a result of broader problems in police practices or simply as isolated incidents? We employ attribution theory and social identity theory to understand how social and political identities influence beliefs about police use of force against African Americans. We argue that racial and political identities predispose individuals to believe certain attributional perspectives over others.We test several hypotheses using individual level survey data from two national surveys. Our findings suggest that racial and political identities strongly shape attributions, and these patterns have implications for public trust in government institutions and the ability of police to operate effectively. We conclude with recommendations for police and policymakers.

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confidence: 69%

Bad Apples? Attributions for Police Treatment of African Americans

Haider‐Markel

Joslyn

2017

Anal Soc Iss & Public Policy

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“…Other research on economic evaluations finds that blame attributions can shape the direction of voting as well. Aldrich et al 2014 find that patterns of blaming Democrats in Congress and/ or President Obama were related to vote choice among Tea Party voters in the 2010 congressional midterm elections. Other work finds that holding the government responsible for economic conditions can both benefit (D'Elia and Norpoth 2014;Rudolph and Grant 2002) and hurt (Feldman 1982;Lau and Sears 1981) incumbent presidents.…”

Section: Blame Attributions and The Public's Evaluation Of Women's Underrepresentationmentioning

confidence: 81%

“…There is variation among individuals in the blame attributions they make. For example, partisans are more likely to see government as less deserving of blame when leaders share their party and to make different evaluations of government activities, such as economic conditions (Aldrich et al 2014;Tilley and Hobolt 2011). Ideology also shapes whether people see individual-level or system blame on issues such as who deserves health care or poverty support programs, with liberals being more likely to see the poor as trapped in an unfair social environment, while conservatives focus more on individual limitations (Cozzarelli, Wilkinson and Tagler 2001;Gollust and Lynch 2011).…”

Section: Blame Attributions and The Public's Evaluation Of Women's Underrepresentationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Blaming Women or Blaming the System? Public Perceptions of Women’s Underrepresentation in Elected Office

Dolan

Hansen²

2018

Political Research Quarterly

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While scholars understand some of the reasons for the underrepresentation of women in elected office in the United States, we know almost nothing about what the public sees as the explanation for this reality. We also know relatively little about the degree to which people see women’s underrepresentation as a problem. Drawing on blame attribution theories, we examine whether people believe that there are systematic or individual explanations for the number of women in elected office. As blame explanations often influence positions on outcomes, we also test whether these explanations are related to people’s attitudes toward women in office and their vote choice behaviors in U.S. House races with women candidates present. Using data from a 2014 Cooperative Congressional Election Study (CCES) survey, we find differences among people in the blame explanations they make. These explanations are significantly related to attitudes about women in office but do not influence vote choice decisions when women run for office.

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“…This points to how relatively extreme groups may influence elite behavior through replacement 19 . For purposes of internal validity, this article has focused on within‐legislator changes in behavior, but an important component of the over‐time shift in nationalization is replacement of moderate legislators with more extreme members (Aldrich et al 2014). If broadband emboldens extreme policy demanders, one place where they may be particularly powerful is in House primary elections, which have typically been the domain of more moderate party insiders.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Effects of High‐Information Environments on Legislative Behavior in the US House of Representatives

Trussler

2020

Legislative Studies Qtrly

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I show in this article how changes in the information environment have contributed to the nationalization of legislative behavior. Access to technologies like broadband have eroded local news media resources and led to a more partisan electorate. As such, increased connectivity causes legislators to prioritize national interests over the interests of their constituencies, behavior that is traditionally seen as an electoral liability. I use data on the rollout of broadband to relate changes in the information environment faced by legislators due to the 2002 redistricting to their behavior. I find that legislators who faced more informationally connected environments post‐redistricting voted more in line with their parties, the president, and aligned interest groups. The results are robust to a specification examining within‐member changes in the 108th–111th Congresses. Taken together, these results provide strong evidence that a major contributor to the increasing nationalization of politics is the expansion of access to information.

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Blame, Responsibility, and the Tea Party in the 2010 Midterm Elections

Cited by 12 publications

References 22 publications

Bad Apples? Attributions for Police Treatment of African Americans

Bad Apples? Attributions for Police Treatment of African Americans

Blaming Women or Blaming the System? Public Perceptions of Women’s Underrepresentation in Elected Office

The Effects of High‐Information Environments on Legislative Behavior in the US House of Representatives

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