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This seems like a differently-worded variant of "we get the government we vote for." But that conclusion has been convincingly rejected by sound political scie
by jMyles 9y ago
This seems like a differently-worded variant of "we get the government we vote for." But that conclusion has been convincingly rejected by sound political science for quite a while now.
The policy preferences of the voting constituency in any given national election are not strongly correlated to policy results. This is shown convincingly in Benjamin Ginsberg's book, "Do Elections Matter?" I strongly recommend this book - after reading it, you will never again try to explain away an act of government by attributing it to voter sentiment.
It is a difficult-to-deny fact that, in the USA, the government frequently and quietly advances policies which do not appear to be derived from any kind electoral mandate, nor are favored by a substantial portion of the electorate.
- visarga 9y agoGovernment represents the interests of capital, not of ordinary people.
- fulafel 9y agoIt's not exactly the same idea. But of course I would be interested in hearing if the referenced book could explain away my observations of government/popular opinion alignment in the issues discussed. Random chance is of course one possibility.
- haZard_OS 9y agoI'm interested in the concept but do you have a suggestion for a book published more recently? "Do Elections Matter?" was published almost 30 years ago.
- tsbertalan 9y agoWell, there's [1], but see also references in this Vox article, which hedges that somewhat: [2] [1] https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-study https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-... [2] https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/fi...