Papers by Morris P. Fiorina
The policy-making component of representation in the U.S. and Great Britain has been closely stud... more The policy-making component of representation in the U.S. and Great Britain has been closely studied and compared, but the constituency's component�the handling of constituent complaints and the protection of constituency iilterests�is less well understood. This paper considers two questions about the constituency component of representation: how much and what kinds of casework services d,o MPs as opposed to Congressmen provide, and secondly, what are the statistical determinants of these activities? With regard to the first question, our findings indicate that MPs devote more of their own time and resources to constituency work than do Congressmen. In addition, we identify representatives on both sides of the Atlantic who adopt a more aggressive strategy towards their constituency work. This strategy is manifested by such activities as publicizing successful cases, handling cases which concern local government matters, the frequency of surgeries and the active solicitation of cases. In the second part of this paper, we model these activities as being related to the electoral margin, party and the year the representative was elected. These estimations indicate that casework entrepreneurs in both countries are most likely to be in marginal seats, recently elected and Democrats or Labour. CASEWORK SERVICE IN GREAT BRITAIN AND THE UNITED ST ATES
In both the United States and Great Britain, legislators are surprisingly popular despite the ine... more In both the United States and Great Britain, legislators are surprisingly popular despite the inefficacy of government policies and the worsening of economic conditions. The answer to this small puzzle lies in the determinants of legislative popularity. In this paper we show that legislative popularity in both countries is significantly related to constituency oriented activites such as handling constituents' problems,. maintaining a high visibility in the constituency, defending the special interests of the district, and the like. We propose a three equation structural model which explains the formation of (1) name recognition, (2) the general expectation that the legislator is a dependable constituency man, and (3) the final assessment of the legislator's performance itself. The data we employ come from the 1978 CPS/NES Congressional Elections Study and from a 1979 British Election survey conducted by Gallup for our purposes. 40 G.B.-Helping people. Protecting interests of constituency. Keeping track of civil servants .
Making sense of the civic engagement debate
Civic engagement in American …, 1999
... MAKING SENSE OF THE CIVIC ENGAGEMENT DEBATE 15 As (many, not all) industrial-capitalist natio... more ... MAKING SENSE OF THE CIVIC ENGAGEMENT DEBATE 15 As (many, not all) industrial-capitalist nations became democracies, most citizens won ... From a his-torical-institutional perspective, thetrouble with American democracy today does not lie in sheer social disconnection ...
Rational choice, empirical contributions, and the scientific enterprise
Critical Review, 1995
... practice. If I were to test competing rational choice and symbolic politics explanations of v... more ... practice. If I were to test competing rational choice and symbolic politics explanations of voting behavior and conclude that the evidence supported the former, would partisans of symbolic politics really be convinced? No more ...
More on Partisan Loyalty and the Six Component Model
Flagellating the federal bureaucracy
Society, 1983
A nonequilibrium approach to legislative decision theory
The Paradox of Not Voting: A Decision Theoretic Analysis
American Political Science Review, 1974
Various analysts have noted that the decision to vote in mass elections is difficult to justify f... more Various analysts have noted that the decision to vote in mass elections is difficult to justify from the standpoint of an expected utility maximization model. Put simply, the probability that a citizen's vote will affect the outcome is so small that the expected gains from voting are outweighed by the costs in time and effort. Such analyses treat rational behavior as synonymous with expected utility maximization. In this paper we show that an alternative criterion for decision making under uncertainty, minimax regret, specifies voting under quite general conditions. Both two and three candidate plurality elections are considered. Interestingly, a minimax regret decision maker never votes for his second choice in a three candidate election, whereas expected utility maximizers clearly may. Thus, the model proposed has implications for candidate choice as well as turnout.
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Papers by Morris P. Fiorina