Public opinion matters. It registers itself on the public
consciousness, translates into politics and policy, and impels
politicians to run for office and, once elected, to serve in
particular ways.This is a book about opinion--not opinions. James
Stimson takes the incremental, vacillating, time-trapped data
points of public opinion surveys and transforms them into a
conceptualization of public mood swings that can be measured and
used to predict change, not just to describe it. To do so, he
reaches far back in U.S. survey research and compiles the data in
such a way as to allow the minutiae of attitudes toward abortion,
gun control, and housing to dissolve into a portrait of national
mood and change.Using sophisticated techniques of coding,
statistics, and data equalization, the author has amassed an
unrivaled database from which to extrapolate his findings. The
results go a long way toward calibrating the folklore of political
eras, and the cyclical patterns that emerge show not only the
regulatory impulse of the 1960s and 1970s and the swing away from
it in the 1980s; the cycles also show that we are in the midst of
another major mood swing right now--what the author calls the
"unnoticed liberalism" of current American politics.Concise,
suggestive, and eminently readable, "Public Opinion in America" is
ideal for courses on public opinion, public policy, and methods, as
well as for introductory courses in American government. Examples
and illustrations abound, and appendixes document the measurement
of policy mood from survey research marginals. This revised second
edition includes updated data on public opinion and voters through
the 1996 presidential election.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!