America faces daunting problems stagnant wages, high health care costs, neglected schools, deteriorating public services. Yet the government consistently ignores the needs of its citizens, paying attention instead to donors and organized interests. Real issues are held hostage to demagoguery, partisanship beats practicality, and trust in government withers along with the social safety net. How did we get here? Through decades of dysfunctional government. In Democracy in America? veteran political observers Benjamin I. Page and Martin Gilens marshal an unprecedented array of evidence to show that while other countries have responded to a rapidly changing economy by helping people who've been left behind, the United States has failed to do so. Instead, we have actually exacerbated inequality, enriching corporations and the wealthy while leaving ordinary citizens to fend for themselves. What's the solution? More democracy. More opportunity for citizens to shape what their government does. To repair our democracy, Page and Gilens argue, we must change the way we choose candidates and conduct our elections, reform our governing institutions, and curb the power of money in politics. By doing so, we can reduce polarization and gridlock, address pressing challenges, and enact policies that truly reflect the interests of average Americans. This book presents a damning indictment. But the situation is far from hopeless. With increased democratic participation as their guide, Page and Gilens lay out a set of proposals, Page and Gilens lay out a set of proposals that would boost citizen participation, curb the power of money, and democratize the House and Senate. The only certainty is that inaction is not an option. Now is the time to act to restore and extend American democracy.

In 2016, when millions of Americans voted for Donald Trump, many believed his claims that personal wealth would free him from wealthy donors and allow him to "drain the swamp." But then Trump appointed several billionaires and multimillionaires to high-level positions and pursued billionaire-friendly policies, such as cutting corporate income taxes. Why the change from his fiery campaign rhetoric and promises to the working class? This should not be surprising, argue Benjamin I. Page, Jason Seawright, and Matthew J. Lacombe: As the gap between the wealthiest and the rest of us has widened, the few who hold one billion dollars or more in net worth have begun to play a more and more active part in politics--with serious consequences for democracy in the United States. Page, Seawright, and Lacombe argue that while political contributions offer a window onto billionaires' influence, especially on economic policy, they do not present a full picture of policy preferences and political actions. That is because on some of the most important issues, including taxation, immigration, and Social Security, billionaires have chosen to engage in "stealth politics." They try hard to influence public policy, making large contributions to political parties and policy-focused causes, leading policy-advocacy organizations, holding political fundraisers, and bundling others' contributions--all while rarely talking about public policy to the media. This means that their influence is not only unequal but also largely unaccountable to and unchallengeable by the American people. Stealth politics makes it difficult for ordinary citizens to know what billionaires are doing or mobilize against it. The book closes with remedies citizens can pursue if they wish to make wealthy Americans more politically accountable, such as public financing of political campaigns and easier voting procedures, and notes the broader types of reforms, such as a more progressive income tax system, that would be needed to increase political equality and reinvigorate majoritarian democracy in the United States.

Recent battles in Washington over how to fix America's fiscal failures strengthened the widespread impression that economic issues sharply divide average citizens. Indeed, many commentators split Americans into two opposing groups: uncompromising supporters of unfettered free markets and advocates for government solutions to economic problems. But such dichotomies, Benjamin Page and Lawrence Jacobs contend, ring false. In "Class War?" they present compelling evidence that most Americans favor free enterprise "and" practical government programs to distribute wealth more equitably.

At every income level and in both major political parties, majorities embrace conservative egalitarianism--a philosophy that prizes individualism and self-reliance as well as public intervention to help Americans pursue these ideals on a level playing field. Drawing on hundreds of opinion studies spanning more than seventy years, including a new comprehensive survey, Page and Jacobs reveal that this worldview translates to broad support for policies aimed at narrowing the gap between rich and poor and creating genuine opportunity for all. They find, for example, that across economic, geographical, and ideological lines, most Americans support higher minimum wages, improved public education, wider access to universal health insurance coverage, and the use of tax dollars to fund these programs.

In this surprising and heartening assessment, Page and Jacobs provide our new administration with a popular mandate to combat the economic inequity that plagues our nation.

Can governments do anything right? Can they do anything at all about the problems of poverty and inequality? Despite the recent boom in the U.S. economy, many millions of Americans have been left behind. Poverty rates remain higher than in most other industrialized countries. Income inequality has increased sharply. Yet we are sometimes told that government cannot or should not do anything about it: either these problems are hopeless, or government action is inevitably wasteful and inefficient, or globalization has made governments impotent.
"What Government Can Do" argues, on the contrary, that federal, state, and local governments can and should do a great deal. Benjamin I. Page and James R. Simmons detail what programs have worked and how they can be improved, while introducing the general reader to the fundamentals of social insurance programs such as Social Security and Medicaid, tax structures, minimum wage laws, educational programs, and the concept of "basic needs." Through their discussions of high-profile campaign plans, proposals, successes, and failures, they have written a readable, optimistic, and clear-headed book on government and poverty. And they find that, contrary to popular belief, government policies already do, in fact, help alleviate poverty and economic inequality. Often these policies work far more effectively and efficiently than people realize, and in ways that enhance freedom rather than infringe on it. At the same time, Page and Simmons show how even more could be-and should be-accomplished.
The authors advocate many sweeping policy changes while acknowledging political obstacles (such as the power of money and organized interests in Americanpolitics) that may stand in the way. Yet even those who disagree with their recommendations will come away with a deepened understanding of how social and economic policies actually work. Exploring ideas often ignored in Beltway political discourse, "What Government Can Do" challenges all Americans to raise the level of public debate and improve our public policies.

Recent battles in Washington over how to fix America's fiscal failures strengthened the widespread impression that economic issues sharply divide average citizens. Indeed, many commentators split Americans into two opposing groups: uncompromising supporters of unfettered free markets and advocates for government solutions to economic problems. But such dichotomies, Benjamin Page and Lawrence Jacobs contend, ring false. In "Class War?" they present compelling evidence that most Americans favor free enterprise "and" practical government programs to distribute wealth more equitably.

At every income level and in both major political parties, majorities embrace conservative egalitarianism--a philosophy that prizes individualism and self-reliance as well as public intervention to help Americans pursue these ideals on a level playing field. Drawing on hundreds of opinion studies spanning more than seventy years, including a new comprehensive survey, Page and Jacobs reveal that this worldview translates to broad support for policies aimed at narrowing the gap between rich and poor and creating genuine opportunity for all. They find, for example, that across economic, geographical, and ideological lines, most Americans support higher minimum wages, improved public education, wider access to universal health insurance coverage, and the use of tax dollars to fund these programs.

In this surprising and heartening assessment, Page and Jacobs provide our new administration with a popular mandate to combat the economic inequity that plagues our nation.

This monumental study is a comprehensive critical survey of the policy preferences of the American public, and will be the definitive work on American public opinion for some time to come. Drawing on an enormous body of public opinion data, Benjamin I. Page and Robert Y. Shapiro provide the richest available portrait of the political views of Americans, from the 1930's to 1990. They not only cover all types of domestic and foreign policy issues, but also consider how opinions vary by age, gender, race, region, and the like.
The authors unequivocally demonstrate that, notwithstanding fluctuations in the opinions of individuals, "collective" public opinion is remarkably coherent: it reflects a stable system of values shared by the majority of Americans and it responds sensitively to new events, arguments, and information reported in the mass media. While documenting some alarming case of manipulation, Page and Shapiro solidly establish the soundness and value of collective political opinion. "The Rational Public" provides a wealth of information about what we as a nation have wanted from government, how we have changed our minds over the years, and why.
For anyone interested in the short- and long-term trends in Americans' policy preferences, or eager to learn what Americans have thought about issues ranging from racial equality to the MX missile, welfare to abortion, this book offers by far the most sophisticated and detailed treatment available.

With world affairs so troubled, what kind of foreign policy should the United States pursue? Benjamin Page and Marshall Bouton look for answers in a surprising place: among the American people. Drawing on a series of national surveys conducted between 1974 and 2004, Page and Bouton reveal that--contrary to conventional wisdom--Americans generally hold durable, coherent, and sensible opinions about foreign policy. Nonetheless, their opinions often stand in opposition to those of policymakers, usually because of different interests and values, rather than superior wisdom among the elite. "The Foreign Policy Disconnect" argues that these gaps between leaders and the public are harmful, and that by using public opinion as a guideline policymakers could craft a more effective, sustainable, and democratic foreign policy.
Page and Bouton support this argument by painting a uniquely comprehensive portrait of the military, diplomatic, and economic foreign policies Americans favor. They show, for example, that protecting American jobs is just as important to the public as security from attack, a goal the current administration seems to pursue single-mindedly. And contrary to some officials' unilateral tendencies, the public consistently and overwhelmingly favors cooperative multilateral policy and participation in international treaties. Moreover, Americans' foreign policy opinions are seldom divided along the usual lines: majorities of virtually all social, ideological, and partisan groups seek a policy that pursues the goals of security and justice through cooperative means. Written in a clear and engaging style, "The Foreign Policy Disconnect "calls, in an original voice, for a moredemocratic approach to creating such a policy.

Do politicians listen to the public? How often and when? Or are the views of the public manipulated or used strategically by political and economic elites? Navigating Public Opinion brings together leading scholars of American politics to assess and debate these questions. It describes how the relationship between opinion and policy has changed over time; how key political actors use public opinion to formulate domestic and foreign policy; and how new measurement techniques might improve our understanding of public opinion in contemporary polling and survey research.

The distinguished contributors shed new light on several long-standing controversies over policy responsiveness to public opinion. Featuring a new analysis by Robert Erikson, Michael MacKuen, and James Stimson that builds from their pathbreaking work on how public mood moves policy in a macro-model of policymaking, the volume also includes several critiques of this model by Lawrence Jacobs and Robert Shapiro, another critique by G. William Domhoff, and a rejoinder by Erikson and his coauthors. Other highlights include discussions of how political elites, including state-level policymakers, presidents, and makers of foreign policy, use (or shape) public opinion; and analyses of new methods for measuring public opinion such as survey-based experiments, probabilistic polling methods, non-survey-based measures of public opinion, and the potential and limitations of Internet polls and surveys. Introductory and concluding essays provide useful background context and offer an authoritative summary of what is known about how public opinion influences public policy.

A must-have for all students of American politics, public opinion, and polling, this state-of-the-art collection addresses issues that lie at the heart of democratic governance today.

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1983.

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1983.