Congruence between Citizens and Policymakers in Two Visions of Liberal Democracy

Abstract

This paper explores two quite different visions of the democratic processes that can create congruence between citizen preferences and public policies. In the Majority Control vision, electoral competition and citizen choices result in the direct election of governments committed to policies corresponding to the preferences of the median voter. In the Proportionate Influence vision, election outcomes result in legislatures that reflect the preferences of all citizens; legislative bargaining results in policies linked to the position of the median voter. The authors give more explicit theoretical form to those visions and link them empirically to specific types of modern democracies. They then attempt to test the success of each vision in bringing about congruence between citizen self-placements and the estimated positions of governments and policymaker coalitions on the left-right scale in twelve nations in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Although the analysis reveals weaknesses in each approach, it suggests a consistent advantage for the Proportionate Influence vision.

Differential Responsiveness in Europe: The Effects of Preference Difference and Electoral Participation

“…Political parties can be expected to converge towards the median voter, or a government would include the median party (linked to the median voter), so that the governing majority is defined by that median voter (Downs 1957). Thus, in either system for translating votes into governments (plural and proportional) it has been argued that the median voter is crucial, and would be specifically influential in determining policies (see Huber and Powell 1994;Kang and Powell 2010). Considering that the issue we look at concerns income redistribution, this median citizen is most likely placed within the middle-income group.…”

Party Policy Diffusion

“…First, it provides a common, well-understood language of policy preferences for which data are available both for party elites and masses. Second, more than any single issue, the left-right dimension seizes the primary bases of political competition across national settings (e.g., Huber and Powell 1994;Powell 2000;McDonald and Budge 2005). Finally, in established democracies, the substance of "left" and "right" aligns with preferences over the among the most salient to voters over the past decades (Huber and Inglehart 1995;Warwick 2002).…”

coalition governance and foreign policy decision-making

“…For example, Huber and Powell (1994) conclude that the congruence between citizens (voters) and policy makers is often higher in coalition governments than in single-party governments. Also, coalitions are associated with the prevention of societal conflict.…”