Alexander examines interest group involvement in direct
democracy. The tools of direct democracy--initiative, referendum,
and recall--were initially created to delimit the power of economic
interest groups and curb the power of political machines. Today,
however, many believe that direct democracy has become a tool
dominated by economic interests and that ballot contests have
emboldened moneyed interests, rather than stemming their power.
This unanticipated consequence of direct democracy has been coined
the Populist Paradox.
Through two case studies, Alexander examines how debilitating
the Populist Paradox truly is. The issue of gambling was selected
due to the large number of affected interests and the degree of
conflict enveloping the issue. Current research suggests that
economic interest groups are best able to mobilize monetary
resoures, while citizen groups are best able to mobilize personnel
resources. The question then turns to whether the differential
ability to mobilize resources translates to success or failure for
groups with different bases of support. Populist and Progressive
reformers obviously did not foresee the advent of campaign
consultants, focus groups, direct mail, and paid petitioners. These
changes in political campaigning have made the ability to mobilize
personnel resources much less important. Alexander provides a
valuable extension to current knowledge of group involvement in
ballot campaigns that will be of particular interest to scholars,
students, and other researchers involved with state and local
public policy.
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