Partisan Context and Procedural Values: Attitudes Towards Presidential Secrecy Before and after the 2016 US Election

Abstract

What shapes attitudes towards procedural rules that constrain executive power? This letter argues that procedural values are contextual: A function of who is in power. Supporters of those in power prefer fewer procedural constraints, while opposition supporters prefer greater. This study reports the results of a unique test using data from the 2016 Cooperative Congressional Election Survey. Respondents were asked, in both pre- and post-election waves, if they thought it should be ‘easier or harder for the president to keep documents secret from the public’. The panel design makes it possible to track individual changes following the shift in political context. The results show evidence of a partisan ‘flip’ in attitudes following the election, with Republicans becoming less likely – and Democrats more likely – to prefer additional constraints on presidential secrecy. However, this partisan ‘flip’ is present only among higher political knowledge respondents.

Standing up for Democracy? Explaining Citizens’ Support for Democratic Checks and Balances

“…The hypocrisy entails that public commitment to democracy coexists with willingness to support politicians who would violate basic tenets of democratic rule. These studies suggest that support for democratic procedures is contextual and depends on the voter's party identification and the strength of this identification (see also Berliner, 2020). But why would citizens who value democracy allow their representatives to undermine it?…”

“…But recent evidence hints that even in established democracies, such as the US, support for democracy might be rather thin and that voters are willing to "trade-off democratic principles for … political ideology, partisan loyalty, and policy preferences" (Graham & Svolik, 2020, p. 393). Similarly, Berliner (2020) finds that in the US support for democratic procedures depends on the strength of the voter's party allegiance (see also Carey et al, 2020).…”

Does Public Support for Judicial Power Depend on Who is in Political Power? Testing a Theory of Partisan Alignment in Africa

“… 27 Berliner (2019), for example, shows that partisan alignment with the president in the United States can influence attitudes about government transparency and secrecy.…”

Winning and Losing Democratic Elections: Effects on Political and Social Attitudes and Subjective Well-Being

“…A related literature find a winners-losers gap with respect to support for democratic checks and balances and various accountability mechanisms (Berliner, 2020;Graham & Svolik, 2020;Moehler, 2009;Singer, 2018). But with regard to these political attitudes, support among electoral losers increases rather than decreases.…”

“…For the importance of free and fair elections, we hypothesize that election winners score higher: after all, they just benefited from this feature of the political process. For the importance of checks and balances, we hypothesize that election losers will score higher: this is because the losers of the current elections need these checks and balances to limit the power of the government they do not support and to guarantee a fair political process until the next elections (Berliner, 2020;Singer, 2018). The same expectation holds for the freedom to express extreme political views.…”