| LEC # | TOPICS | READINGS |
|---|---|---|
| Part 1: Introduction and Preliminariesa | ||
| 1 | What is the Role of Government? | Wilson, James. Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do and Why They Do It. New York: Basic Books, 1989. Chapter 19. U.S. Constitution. |
| Part 2: Institutions and American Politics | ||
| 2 | Understanding Institutions: The Median Voter Theorem | Stewart, Charles. Analyzing Congress. New York: Norton, 2001. Chapter 1. |
| 3 | Agenda Setting: The Committee Model | Krehbiel, Keith. Pivotal Politics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. Chapters 1-2. Fenno. Congressmen in Committees. Boston: Boston, Little, and Brown, 1973. Chapter 1. |
| 4 | Making Legislation: Veto Players | Cameron, Charles. Veto Bargaining. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Chapters 1, 3, 5, 8 and 9. |
| 5 | Making Legislation: Ideas and Policy Entrepreneurs | Kingdon, John. Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies. New York: Longman, 2003. Chapters 1, 4, 8 and 9. |
| 6 | The Preferences of Policymakers: Elections and Responsiveness | Fiorina, Morris. "The Decline of Collective Responsibility in American Politics." Daedalus Summer, 1980:25-46. Ansolabehere, Steve, Jim Snyder, and Charles Stewart. "Candidate Positions in Congressional Elections." American Journal of Political Science 45: 136-159. |
| Part 3: Public Opinion, Elections, and Democracy | ||
| 7 | Campaigns and Elections | Larry, Bartels. "Candidate Choice and the Dynamics of the Presidential Nominating Process." American Journal of Political Science 31: 1-30. Gellman, Andrew, and Gary King. "Why Are American Presidential Election Campaign Polls so Variable When Votes Are so Predictable?" British Journal of Political Science 23:409--451. |
| 8 | The Measure and Meaning of Public Opinion | Brady, Henry, and Gary Orren. Media Polls in American Politics. Edited by Mann, and Orren. Washington, D.C. : Brookings Institution, 1992. Chapter 4. Zaller, John. The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Chapters 2-4. |
| 9 | The Structure of Public Opinion | Kinder, Donald. "Opinion and Action in the Realm of Politics." in Handbook of Social Psychology, 4th Edition. Edited by Daniel Todd Gilbert, Susan T. Fiske, and Gardner Lindzey, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1988. pp. 778-867. |
| 10 | Understanding Public Opinion and American Politics: War and Race | Mueller, John. "Trends in Popular Support for the Wars in Vietnam and Korea." The American Political Science Review , 65 (June, 1971), 358-375. Zaller, John. The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion.New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Chapter 9. Kinder, Donald R. and Lynn M. Sanders. Divided by Color.Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996. Chapters 4 and 7. |
| Part 4: Personal Interests and Political Equality | ||
| 11 | Mobilization of Interests | Olson, Mancur. The Logic of Collective Action. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971. Chapters 1 and 2. Kritzer. "The Government Gorilla: Why Does Government Come Out Ahead?" in In Litigation: Do the 'Haves' Still Come Out Ahead? Edited by Herbert M. Kritzer and Susan S. Silbey, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003. pp.342-370. |
| 12 | Participation and the Political System | Rosenstone, Steven and John Mark Hansen. Mobilization, Participation, and Democracy in America. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Education, 1996. Chapters 4-6. Dahl, Robert. Who Governs. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979. Chapters 1, 19, 24, 27 and 28. |
| Part 5: American Politics: Bringing it all Together | ||
| 13 | The Welfare Implications of Government | Dahl, Robert. How Democratic is the American Constitution?Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1980. (Entire) |
| 14 | Conclusions | |