Reagan's Support Research Articles

“Disobedient” Generals and the Politics of Redemocratization: The Clinton Administration and Haiti

U.S. policy toward political transitions in postwar Latin America has centered around the goal of securing regime changes that ensure the continuity of the state. This is true of Republican and Democratic administrations under both conservative and liberal presidents. While issues of democracy and dictatorship have remained secondary, the task of preserving the institutions of the state (civil bureaucracies, judiciaries, military and police, etc.) have taken priority. The level of Washington's concern over challenges to the state has been incomparably greater than over changes in regime because the state, especially its coercive institutions, is perceived as the ultimate arbiter of power and guarantor of basic U.S. interests in these societies. Consequently, Washington's policy toward the state in Latin America has remained constant; toward the regime it has been variable. Whether we are discussing Eisenhower policy toward Cuba, the Kennedy-Johnson approach toward the Dominican Republic and Brazil, Richard Nixon's hostility toward Allende's Chile, Jimmy Carter's policy toward Nicaragua and El Salvador, or Ronald Reagan's support for redemocratization in Guatemala, the thread that linked them all was a singular determination to preserve key state institutions

Economic and Foreign Policy as Sources of Reagan Support

Economic and Foreign Policy as Sources of Reagan Support

Economic and Foreign Policy as Sources of Reagan Support

Economic and Foreign Policy as Sources of Reagan Support

Political Science in Four Presidential Elections

Political Science in Four Presidential Elections

Ronald Reagan and the social issues: Rhetorical support for the Christian Right

While scholars have studied the manner in which the Christian Right supported President Reagan, they have neglected to examine Reagan's support for the Christian Right. The purpose of this research to is analyze the public support Reagan accorded the legislative objectives of the Christian Right, through an examination of his State of the Union addresses. Among the findings are that Reagan devoted limited (but significant) attention to the social issues, focused primarily on the need for traditional values, anti-abortion, and school prayer legislation, and employed rather restrained language in support of the social issues.

PRESIDENTIAL SUPPORT DURING THE IRAN-CONTRA AFFAIR

The great majority of analyses of presidential support utilize aggregate data and, consequently, are not appropriate for the analysis of individual-level changes in support in response to events within an administration. Using National Election Studies panel data, we investigate presidential support both before and after the major revelations of the Iran-Contra affair to determine the reasons behind the erosion of President Reagan's support base and the characteristics of individuals who did, and did not, adjust their views of the president subsequent to the revelations. While Reagan maintained his image of integrity, respondents did downgrade his competence; his performance was most seriously questioned by those disapproving of his Central American policy.

Telling America's story: Narrative form and the Reagan presidency

The character of Reagan's rhetoric and the response to it can be explained by its narrative form. The dominance of narrative in Reagan's discourse and the nature of the narrative form combine to differentiate the perspective of Reagan's supporters and his opponents. Three characteristics of narrative form—a story‐based truth, an emphasis on morality, and a grounding in common sense—explain the way in which narrative affects political judgment. The analysis reveals the power of narrative form and, in contrast to the assertions of some narrative theorists, its fragility and moral limitations.

Authoritarianism and Canadian Voting Preferences for Political Party, Prime Minister, and President

Research was initiated to determine whether authoritarianism was related to preferences for political party and leader in the 1984 Canadian federal election, whether more authoritarian Canadians would show a preference for Reagan over Mondale, and whether dogmatism would also discriminate between conservative and liberal selections. A questionnaire was completed by 106 introductory psychology students which contained an F scale, a dogmatism scale, and items to indicate preferences for political party, leader, and Reagan or Mondale. Neither authoritarianism nor dogmatism was related to preference for Canadian political party or leader. However, supporting Rokeach's (1960) contentions, Reagan supporters were significantly higher than Mondale supporters on the authoritarianism dimension but supporters of the two candidates were not significantly different on the dogmatism measure.

Attitude Change in an Electoral Context as a Function of Expectations Not Being Fulfilled

Attitudes toward Carter and Reagan before and after the 1980 election were analyzed in relation to several hypotheses regarding attitude change. The results supported the hypothesis, derived from the theory of cognitive dissonance, that people whose expectations are not fulfilled by the electoral outcome are likely to change their attitudes. Another hypothesis from dissonance theory, that people show a larger differentiation in their attitudes toward the candidates after the election, was sustained only among Reagan supporters. Overall, people in the national sample did change their preelection attitudes after the election, becoming somewhat more favorable toward Reagan, the winner, and slightly less favorable toward Carter, the loser.

Gender Differences in Policy Preferences: A Summary of Trends From the 1960s to the 1980s

Gender Differences in Policy Preferences: A Summary of Trends From the 1960s to the 1980s

Evangelical Politics: Generalizations and Implications

Several generalizations find support in these articles: (1) Religion entered the 1984 presidential campaign even more than the 1980 campaign, which contained more religion than the 1976 campaign, which brought presidential religion to public attention for the first time since Kennedy's Catholicism in 1960. Richard Pierard's paper bears most directly on this generalization, of course, but if the generalization is correct, we have an interesting reason to ask why this religious escalation is occurring and whether it will continue. 2. It is not at all clear whether Ronald Reagan derives a net benefit from the support he receives from the Christian Right. The evidence, quite direct in the Johnson-Tamney and Simpson papers and indirect in the Hood-Morris paper, suggests an instance of the classic "cross-pressures" dilemma: the very same social forces predisposing people toward a Christian right outlook (and thus a positive view of the Reagan candidacy) also predispose people toward the Democratic Party (and thus a negative view of the Reagan candidacy). Thus, Johnson and Tamney report the otherwise anomalous finding that Reagan support in 1984 was greatest among those only "moderately" Christian rightist. 3. Similarly, being on the Christian right is not merely a disguised way of being a Republican supporter. Hood and Morris make a convincing case for the notion that certain fundamentalist views are so fundamental to their holders that, unless politicians are "correct" on those, their other views are largely irrelevant to voting choice.

Promise and Performance: A Dynamic Model of Presidential Popularity

The growth of public opinion measurement in the last 40 years has added a new dimension to the study of presidential behavior. Not only have public evaluations become more newsworthy, but the importance of public support as a resource and determinant of political survival has been enhanced. Recent scholarship on the presidency has documented the value of public support, attempted to identify its major determinants, and speculated about the manner in which presidents might influence these evaluations.This research is designed to integrate these concerns into a single model and thereby to examine the interdependence between public support as a product of citizen decisions and as a political resource. First, a characterization of the citizen as an evaluator of the president is developed and used to construct an equation of presidential approval. Next, we develop an equation that explains presidential effectiveness in the legislative arena and illustrates the operation of public support as a presidential resource. The public support and legislative effectiveness equations are specified as a simultaneous equation system, estimated, and evaluated. The results of the model are then used to expand the conventional wisdom about the determinants of public support, to examine the consequences of the reciprocal relationship between public support and legislative success, and to generate ex post forecasts of President Reagan's support from 1981 through 1983.

The Knives Are Out for OSTP

The Knives Are Out for OSTP

The Abortion Issue in the 1980 Elections

The political opponents of legal abortion achieved considerable gains in the 1980 American elections. A president who was committed to a strong antiabortion position was elected, and antiabortion candidates prevailed in six out of seven Senate races that pitted supporters against opponents of legal abortion and in seven out of nine similar confrontations in the House races. However, it is not clear that abortion was an overriding or decisive factor in determining those outcomes. Democrats and Republicans, Carter voters and Reagan voters did not differ significantly in their attitudes toward abortion. The presidential voter groups were divided on several other issues, and along income and racial lines, to a far greater extent than they were on abortion. Voters were not likely to name abortion as one of the more important problems facing the nation. Carter supporters rated abortion as more important than did Reagan supporters. Although the party platforms and the presidential candidates were clearly differentiated in their abortion stands, these differences were not well communicated to the citizenry. When voters attempted to describe the position of each candidate on abortion, they displayed a great deal of uncertainty, error and confusion. In the key Senate races, those who voted for the prochoice candidates held more liberal abortion attitudes than those who voted for the right-to-life candidates. This difference, although statistically significant, was not great, and was smaller than the differences related to several other issues--such as attitudes toward the role of government, women's rights and economic policies.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

College Students' Values and Presidential Preference in the 1980 Election

Rokeach (1973) proposed a model of political ideologies based on the extent to which people value freedom and equality. Socialists are defined as persons who value freedom and equality highly, capitalists place a high value on freedom but a low value on equality, communists place a low value on freedom but a high value on equality, and facists place a low value on both freedom and equality. In the United States, liberals are predicted to have the socialist value pattern and conservatives are predicted to have the capitalist value pattern. Rokeach (1973) successfully tested these predictions during the 1968 U.S. presidential election, and this study attempted to replicate these findings during the 1980 election. The subjects were 423 students (235 female, 188 male) at a Southern university. They ranged from 16 to 59 yr. of age (M = 19 8 yr.). There were 361 whites, 52 blzcks, and 10 students who did not indicate their race. These subjects completed Rokeach's Value Survey and indicated their presidential candidate preference during September or October of 1980. Eleven subjects were dropped from the study because they failed to indicate preferences for a candidate. Reagan was preferred by 175 subjects, Carter by 172 subjects, and Anderson by 65 subjects. Rankings for each of the 36 values on the Value Survey were converted to z-scores (Hays, 1967) and entered into a one-way analysis of variance, with preference for a candidate as the independent variable. Where significant Fs occurred (p < .05), Tukey B tests were used to compare individual means. If the Rokeach model is correct supporters of conservative candidates should value equalicy less than supporters of liberal candidates but no differences should exist for values placed on freedom. The results are consistent with this model. Reagan supporters (M = -.47) place less value on equality than supporters of Anderson (M = -.18) or Carter (M = M.20). Supporters of Anderson (M = .39), Carter (M = .40), and Reagan (M = .42) do not differ significantly in their valuing of freedom. Among the other 34 values, Carter's supporters value a world at peace and happiness more rhan do Reagan's supporters. Anderson's supporters value being imaginative more, but obtaining salvation less, rhan supporters of Caner and Reagan.