politics and government

More Education for the Educated? Public Opinion on Social Policy Reforms in Western Europe

In the latest contribution to the Democracy Papers, Marius R. Busemeyer explores which coalitions of citizens support various welfare state reforms in European countries. Recent years have seen the social safety net in these countries increasingly move toward a social investment model, whereby states help individuals invest in education and training. Busemeyer shows that, compared to other models of the welfare state, social investment policies enjoy broad-based support among many European publics, concerns about the potentially regressive effects of these policies notwithstanding.

Unequal Political Voice in the New American Gilded Age

by Kay Lehman Schlozman, Henry Brady and Sidney Verba

In the latest contribution to the Democracy Papers, Kay Schlozman, Henry Brady, and Sidney Verba give an authoritative overview of inequalities of political voice in the United States. Drawing on their recently published book, Unequal and Unrepresented: Political Inequality and the People’s Voice in the New Gilded Age, they show that not only has American political life long been dominated by inequalities of political voice, but also that these inequalities have been further accentuated by the increasing importance of money in politics.

The Multiple Forms of Bipartisanship: Political Alignments in US Foreign Policy

by Jordan Tama

Jordan Tama, an awardee of a Negotiating Agreement in Congress grant (a component of the SSRC’s Anxieties of Democracy program) identifies an intriguing anomaly: greater bipartisanship in the US Congress on foreign policy than domestic issues. Tama examines the different forms this aisle-crossing may take—sometimes in broad opposition to the president’s policy preferences, and at other times when intraparty factions unite across party lines. He sees ideology, interest group politics, and institutional incentives as the key sources for foreign policy bipartisanship, and concludes with how these dynamics are playing out in the Trump administration.