Political Science 40 Final

• Affective Polarization


  We feel more positively towards people similar to us and more negatively towards people more dissimilar to us.

  When it comes to groups like political parties, our attitudes may change because the groups have changed.
• Agency Loss


  Authority must be delegated, where individuals/groups with power authorize someone to act on their behalf.

  Agency loss is when agents don't do exactly what the principal wants of them.

  Agency loss, for example:

  - Principal was unclear with instructions. (Or, multiple gave competing instructions.)

  - Agents have divergent goals from principles.
• Australian Ballot


  Australian ballot, nonpartisan civil service, primary elections, nonpartisan local elections, direct democracy, voter registration.

  Between 1888 and 1896, 90 percent of the states adopted the Australian ballot, named for its country of origin. The new type of ballot, still in use today, was prepared by the government, listed candidates from all parties, and was marked in the privacy of a voting booth. This change made it much more difficult for parties to exchange favors for votes because it left no (legal) way for the party to know if voters had kept their side of the bargain.

  With adoption of the Australian ballot, the government became involved in party nominations, for someone had to determine officially which parties and names would be listed on the government-produced ballot. Laws were passed to regulate party nominating conventions and, later, to allow a party's voters to nominate candidates through primary elections; primaries deprived them of a crucial political resource: the ability to control access to elective public office by controlling nominations.
• Bicameralism


  House and Senate. They each have expressed powers.

  House of Representatives:

  House elected every 2 years by the "people of the several states"

  Representatives apporti9oned according to free people:

  Plus three fifths of the number of slaves

  Not including untaxed Native Americans

  Each state gets at least 1

  The Senate:

  The Senate is composed of 2 Senators from each state.

  Elected for staggered six year terms.

  The practice of having two legislative or parliamentary chambers that share power.
• Bill of Rights


  The first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
• Brown v. the Board of Education

  Civil Rights:

  Action: Successes in the Courts, e.g. Brown v Board of Education of Topeka. 1954.

  How: NAACP strategy of litigation, and New Deal appointments to federal courts.

  Outcome: Decides "separate is inherently unequal" when it comes to education. Beginning of national awareness of Jim Crow.

  The 1950s saw only modest advances in civil rights, but a new coalition—requiring renewed support for civil rights from the Republican Party and profound shifts within the Democratic Party, whose leaders historically had been hostile to the cause of African Americans—set the stage for success.

  This case is a landmark event.
• Buckley v. Valeo


  Expenditure limits struck down

  Contribution limits upheld

  "Although the Act's contribution and expenditure limitations both implicate fundamental First Amendment interests, its expenditure ceilings impose significantly more severe restrictions on protected freedoms of political expression and association than do its limitations on financial contributions."

  Upheld the reporting requirements and contribution limits (to prevent "corruption or the appearance of corruption") but rejected spending limits bc they interfered with political speech protected by the First Amendment. Presidential candidates could be required to abide by spending limits as a condition of receiving public funds for their campaigns.

  In Buckley the Court overturned, again on First Amendment grounds, ceilings on how much of their own money candidates could spend on their campaigns and on how much anyone could spend to agitate for or against candidates independently of candidates' campaigns.
• Checks and Balances


  A constitutional mechanism giving each branch some oversight and control of the other branches. Examples are the presidential veto, Senate approval of presidential appointments, and judicial review of presidential and congressional actions.
• Cloture


  A parliamentary procedure used to close debate. Cloture is used in the Senate to cut off filibusters. Under the current Senate rules, three-fifths of senators, or sixty, must vote for cloture to halt a filibuster except on presidential nominations to offices other than Supreme Court justice.
• Commerce Clause


  The clause in Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution that gives Congress the authority to regulate commerce with other nations and among the states.
• Confederation


  A political system in which states or regional governments retain ultimate authority except for those powers they expressly delegate to a central government.

  political power vested in a central authority.

  an organization which consists of a number of parties or groups united in an alliance or league.
• Conference Committee


  A temporary joint committee of the House and Senate appointed to reconcile the differences between the two chambers on a particular piece of legislation.
• De Facto Segregation


  Segregation that results from practice rather than from law.

  Outcome of Plessy v Ferguson and the Jim Crow laws, related to "separate but equal."
• Divided Government


  A term used to describe government when one political party controls the executive branch and the other political party controls one or both houses of the legislature.
• Dominant Strategy


  The dominant strategy in game theory refers to a situation where one player has superior tactics regardless of how their opponent may play. A dominant strategy is one that is the best response to any strategy chosen by the other player(s). A dominated strategy gives a lower payoff than some other strategy, no matter what the other player does.
• Duverger's Law


  Plurality or "majoritarian" elections tend to cultivate two-party systems.

  Third parties get tired of losing.

  Voters get tired of "wasting" votes. There is a systematic relationship between electoral systems and party systems, so that plutality single-member district election systems tend to creat two-party system in the legislature, while proportional representation electoral systems generate multiparty systems.
• Electoral College


  A body of electors in each state, chosen by voters, who formally elect the president and vice president of the United States. Each state's number of electoral votes equals its representation in Congress; the District of Columbia has three votes. An absolute majority of the total electoral vote is required to elect a president and vice president.
• Enumerated Powers


  The explicit powers given to Congress by the Constitution in Article I, Section 8. These include the powers of taxation, coinage of money, regulation of commerce, and provision for the national defense.
• Executive Order


  A presidential directive to an executive agency establishing new policies or indicating how an existing policy is to be carried out.
• Federalist


  Name given to two related, but not identical, groups in late-eighteenth-century American politics. The first group, led by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, supported ratification of the Constitution in 1787 and 1788. Subsequently, Hamilton and John Adams led the second group, the Federalist Party, which dominated national politics during the administrations of George Washington (1789-1797) and Adams (1797-1801).
• Free-Rider Problem


  A situation in which individuals can receive the benefits from a collective activity whether or not they helped to pay for it, leaving them with no incentive to contribute.

  Institutions are a solution.

  Institutions to make decisions
• Gerrymandering


  Drawing legislative districts in such a way as to give one political party a disproportionately large share of seats for the share of votes its candidates win.

  two types of gerrymandering

  basically drawing the districts and the state legislature draws the districts. it is the state legislators who also split or pack voters.

  can help a party gain seats
• Great Compromise


  The agreement between large and small states at the Constitutional Convention (1787) that decided the selection and composition of Congress. The compromise stipulated that the lower chamber (House of Representatives) be chosen by direct popular vote and that the upper chamber (Senate) be selected by the state legislatures. Representation in the House would be proportional to a state's population; in the Senate each state would have two members.
• Ideological Polarization


  People are moving away from the middle of their political beliefs

  Extreme views are becoming more common

  Polarization is always changing over time.

  Effect on public opinion when many citizens move away from moderate positions and towards either end of the political spectrum, identifying themselves as either liberals or conservatives.
• Incumbency Advantage


  Incumbents possess perks of office that challengers do not possess: Resources such as staff, Brand name, Experience, Power (i.e. to allocate pork),

  Challengers do have some advantages as well: Clean record, Outsider status, Newness (?).

  The advantage that the incumbent (individual currently holding office) candidate has over the challenger candidate. The advantage that accrues to the incumbent beyond party because of actions the incumbent has taken [personal vote]
• Jim Crow Laws


  A series of laws enacted in the late nineteenth century by southern states to institute segregation. These laws created "whites only" public accommodations such as schools, hotels, and restaurants.

  (named after a popular minstrel show character of the era) were adopted throughout the South to disenfranchise Black citizens and physically separate African Americans and whites
• Judicial Review


  The authority of a court to declare legislative and executive acts unconstitutional and therefore invalid.
• Latent Opinion


  Opinions formed on the spot when they are asked about the subject or only when necessary. Delayed/future opinion voters will have if a certain policy is passed. Important for politicians who desire re-election to consider bc they don't want to vote for something that will make them look bad later.
• Motivated Reasoning


  People reason in a way that supports their interests. A "tendency to find arguments in favor of conclusions we want to believe to be stronger than arguments for conclusions we do not want to believe."

  Related: confirmation bias (tendency to put greater credence)

  Cognitive bias; an emotion-biased decision-making phenomenon, a rationalization process driven by unconscious affective biases.
• Lobbying


  activities aimed to influence directly the decisions made by public officials.

  Lobbyists: professionals whose full-time job is to lobby on behalf of clients.

  Lawyers, former staff or members of Congress, and others with skills or connections.What do lobbyists/interest groups do to promote their causes?

  - Information that officials want.

  - "Social lobbying"

  - Grassroots lobbying

  - Issue advocacy → public opinion

  - Direct action (protests, sit-ins, rallies.)

  - Litigation

  - Bribery cases, though rare & illegal

  - Campaign contributions
• Nationalization of Politics


  Shifting of political agenda within the local, state, and federal level. Becoming a National political debate/issue.

  Claim that people vote in local elections based on their national party preferences (Schleicher 2017); Related to the claim that elections have "nationalized."

  State and local elections are based on people's preference of the national elections.
• Necessary and Proper Clause

  The last clause of Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution. This clause grants Congress the authority to make all laws that are "necessary and proper" and to execute those laws.
• Normative Claim


  Normative: The realm of values

  Asserts that such-and-such OUGHT to be the case. Something based on value and what "should" be done rather than what could be done.

  Vs. the Positive Claim: The realm of facts.

  Question normative commitments by questioning their positive underpinning
• Originalism


  A view that the Constitution should be interpreted according to the original intentions or original meaning of the Framers. Many conservatives support this view.
• Party Identification


  An individual's enduring affective or instrumental attachment to one of the political parties; the most accurate single predictor of voting behavior.
• Party Sorting


  The alignment of partisanship and issue positions so that Democrats tend to take more liberal positions and Republicans tend to take more conservative ones. Partially contributes to polarization.

  there is abundant evidence that Americans have responded to the clearer cues issuing from the more polarized political class by sorting themselves more consistently into the party that best fits their own political beliefs and preferences.
• Patronage


  Granting favors or giving contracts or making appointments to office in return for political support.

  The practice of awarding jobs, grants, licenses, or other special favors in exchange for political support.
• Peer Review


  a review by people with similar professional qualification.

  Publication in academic fields need this. Usually peer-reviewed, often "double blind"

  Paper is commented on by 2-5 anonymous peers, who are chosen by an editor

  Decision still ultimately up to the editor

  There are other variants of this (in law, computer science)
• Performance Voting


  Basing votes for a candidate or party on how successfully the candidate or party performed while in office.
• Primary Election


  An election held before the general election in which voters decide which of a party's candidates will be the party's nominee for the general election.