The Elusive Mandate: Elections and the Mirage of Popular Control

Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Contents vii
3. Illustrations ix
4. Preface xiii
5. Democratic Ideals and Realities 1
6. The Elusive Mandate: Elections and the Mirage of Popular Control 21
7. Tumbling Down into a Democratical Republick: “Pure Democracy” and the Pitfalls of Popular Control 52
8. A Rational God of Vengeance and of Reward ? The Logic of Retrospective Accountability 90
9. Blind Retrospection: Electoral Responses to Droughts, Floods, and Shark Attacks 116
10. Musical Chairs: Economic Voting and the Specious Present 146
11. A Chicken in Every Pot: Ideology and Retrospection in the Great Depression 177
12. The Very Basis of Reasons: Groups, Social Identities, and Political Psychology 213
13. Partisan Hearts and Spleens: Social Identities and Political Change 232
14. It Feels Like We’re Thinking: The Rationalizing Voter 267
15. Groups and Power: Toward a Realist Theory of Democracy 297
16. Appendix: Retrospective Voting as Selection and Sanctioning 329
17. Afterword to the Paperback Edition 335
18. References 345
19. Index 381