The Influence of News Media on Political Elites: Investigating Strategic Responsiveness in Congress

Arceneaux, Kevin; Johnson, Martin; Lindstädt, René; Wielen, Ryan J. Vander

doi:10.1111/ajps.12171

Cited by 78 publications

(60 citation statements)

References 74 publications

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“…In fact, the district‐level measure of the proportion of cable subscribers with access to Fox News used by Arceneaux et al. () correlates with our measure of district‐level Fox News penetration at only 0.22.…”

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confidence: 70%

“…; Clinton and Enamorado ) and helps explain why Democrats in marginal districts with Fox News appeared to move to the right in the months before an election (Arceneaux et al. ): Many of them faced strong challenges from Republicans who Fox News helped coax off the sidelines.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recent scholarship finds that the introduction of Fox News induced members of Congress to move rightward (Clinton and Enamorado ), particularly Democrats serving in Republican‐leaning districts as the general election neared (Arceneaux et al. ). Yet we know little about why members of Congress would respond to the emergence of a national news network.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Strategic Candidate Entry and Congressional Elections in the Era of Fox News

Arceneaux

Dunaway²,

Johnson

et al. 2019

American J Political Sci

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Elections are designed to give voters the ability to hold elected officials accountable for their actions. For this to work, voters must be presented with credible alternatives from which to choose. In the United States, as in other weak‐party systems, the decision to challenge an incumbent representative rests with individual, strategic‐minded politicians who carefully weigh the available information. We investigate the role that one source of information—partisan media—plays in shaping electoral competition. We hypothesize that the haphazard expansion of the conservative Fox News Channel in the decade after its 1996 launch influenced congressional elections by affecting the decision calculus of high‐quality potential candidates. Using congressional district‐level data on the local availability of Fox News, we find that Fox News altered Republican potential candidates' perceptions about the vulnerability of Democratic incumbents, thereby changing their entry patterns.

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confidence: 70%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Strategic Candidate Entry and Congressional Elections in the Era of Fox News

Arceneaux

Dunaway²,

Johnson

et al. 2019

American J Political Sci

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“…Political parties as well as individual MPs pay attention to media coverage, since media coverage influences voters' attitudes. Arceneaux states that, “News coverage influences which issues the public views as important and shapes aggregate opinion on how those issues should be handled” (Iyenger & Kinder ; Arceneaux et al, , 5). Moreover, being covered in the news is a central concern for politicians (Green‐Pedersen et al , 131).…”

Section: The Partisan Logicmentioning

confidence: 99%

MP Firefighting and the Partisan Logic

West

2020

Scand Pol Stud

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Control of executive power is a central accountability concern. This article focuses on ways for parliament and MPs to assist the voter in this important task. Parliamentary systems empower parliaments by a range of control institutions, but the role of political parties challenges MPs incentives to engage in control of government. This article focuses on Fire Alarm control activity, but argues that Fire Alarms call for MP Firefighting. In parliament, MPs have the opportunity to respond to reports from decentral control institutions about government mal‐administration. Building on models of rational politicians, this paper investigates when MPs in fact engage in Firefighting related to Fire Alarm cases from the Ombudsman and audit institution. The article argues that MPs engage in Firefighting when it serves partisan purposes. The paper relies on a medium‐N dataset of reports from the Faroese Ombudsman and Audit General (52 cases) and applies a mixed‐method research design. The results show that the partisan logic dominates MP Firefighting. Opposition MPs use government mistakes to damage government reputation. However, the paper argues of the possibility of a more parliamentarian outcome, since focus on Fire Alarm cases puts pressure on government to make amends.

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“…By estimating the impact of news coverage of lifts of immunity on the likelihood of resignation, we show that the media can help holding representatives accountable prior to the regular end of their mandate or function. Because we investigate the behavior of representatives, our study also relates to the literature on the effects of media on policy making (Besley and Burgess, 2002;Strömberg, 2004b;Eisensee and Strömberg, 2007;Snyder and Strömberg, 2010) and political elites (Campante and Hojman, 2013;Clinton and Enamorado, 2014;Arceneaux et al, 2015;Garcia-Jimeno and Yildirim, 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Politicians under investigation: The news Media's effect on the likelihood of resignation

Garz

Sörensen

2017

Journal of Public Economics

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. We thank Spiegel Publishing for providing access to their newspaper archives. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may AbstractThis paper studies the effect of news media on the probability of resignation from office of politicians being subject to criminal investigation. Using data on cases in which the political immunity of German representatives was lifted, we find that resignations are more common when the media covers the case intensely. The amounts of this news coverage, in turn, depend on the availability of other newsworthy, exogenous events. Therefore, we instrument for coverage of lifts of immunity with the overall news pressure. We estimate the causal effect and find that a 1 standard deviation increase in the amount of the coverage raises the likelihood of resignation by 22.3 percentage points.

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The Influence of News Media on Political Elites: Investigating Strategic Responsiveness in Congress

Cited by 78 publications

References 74 publications

Strategic Candidate Entry and Congressional Elections in the Era of Fox News

Strategic Candidate Entry and Congressional Elections in the Era of Fox News

MP Firefighting and the Partisan Logic

Politicians under investigation: The news Media's effect on the likelihood of resignation

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