1. The Effect of Constituency Size on Public Attitudes About State Governments in the U.S.
- Author
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Bowen, Daniel
- Subjects
- *
DEMOCRACY , *REPRESENTATIVE government , *SOCIAL change , *STATE governments , *POLITICAL attitudes , *POPULATION - Abstract
At the heart of representative democracy is the process and formula by which citizens are grouped together and given the opportunity to select leaders to act on their behalf. Underneath artificial political lines like wards or districts, however, exists a social environment that is always changing and often not in accordance with political boundaries. One dramatic social change in the United States is population growth. American legislatures, by and large, have not been adjusted to account for large population growth during the last half of the 20th century. This paper argues that increases in constituency size - the number of constituents represented by each lawmaker in a legislative chamber - affects the constituent-legislator relationship. Specifically, constituency size has a negative relationship with positive attitudes about state government. Evidence using two national surveys merged with state contextual data and using hierarchical linear modeling supports the argument that large constituency sizes lead to less favorable attitudes toward state government. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2007