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Disclaimer. Don't rely on these old notes in lieu of reading the literature, but they can jog your memory. As a grad student long ago, my peers and I collaborated to write and exchange summaries of political science research. I posted them to a wiki-style website. "Wikisum" is now dead but archived here. I cannot vouch for these notes' accuracy, nor can I say who wrote them.
Jacobson. 1989. Strategic politicians and the dynamics of House elections, 1946-1986. APSR 83:773-793.
Strategic political elites play a pivotal role in translating national conditions into election results and therefore in holding members of Congress collectively accountable for the government's performance. Politicians' strategic career decicions are systematically informed by their perceptions of national political and economic conditions. Thus, "voters need only respond to the choice between candidates and campaigns at the local level to reflect, in their aggregate behavior, national political forces" (p 165).
The major points:
District-level and aggregate time series data from all 21 postwar House elections, 1946-1986
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Tags
Jacobson, Gary (author) • American Politics • Voting • Congress (U.S.) • Elections
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