TY - JOUR
T1 - A public transformed? Welfare reform as policy feedback
AU - Soss, Joe
AU - Schram, Sanford F.
PY - 2007/2
Y1 - 2007/2
N2 - This article analyzes the strategic use of public policy as a tool for reshaping public opinion. In the 1990s, "progressive revisionists" argued that, by reforming welfare, liberals could free the Democratic Party of a significant electoral liability, reduce the race-coding of poverty politics, and produce a public more willing to invest in anti-poverty efforts. Connecting this argument to recent scholarship on policy feedback, we pursue a quantitative case study of the potential for new policies to move public opinion. Our analysis reveals that welfare reform in the 1990s produced few changes in mass opinion. To explain this result, we propose a general framework for the analysis of mass feedback effects. After locating welfare as a "distant- visible" case in this framework, we advance four general propositions that shed light on our case-specific findings as well as the general conditions under which mass feedback effects should be viewed as more or less likely.
AB - This article analyzes the strategic use of public policy as a tool for reshaping public opinion. In the 1990s, "progressive revisionists" argued that, by reforming welfare, liberals could free the Democratic Party of a significant electoral liability, reduce the race-coding of poverty politics, and produce a public more willing to invest in anti-poverty efforts. Connecting this argument to recent scholarship on policy feedback, we pursue a quantitative case study of the potential for new policies to move public opinion. Our analysis reveals that welfare reform in the 1990s produced few changes in mass opinion. To explain this result, we propose a general framework for the analysis of mass feedback effects. After locating welfare as a "distant- visible" case in this framework, we advance four general propositions that shed light on our case-specific findings as well as the general conditions under which mass feedback effects should be viewed as more or less likely.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=33947497619&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=33947497619&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1017/S0003055407070049
DO - 10.1017/S0003055407070049
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:33947497619
SN - 0003-0554
VL - 101
SP - 111
EP - 127
JO - American Political Science Review
JF - American Political Science Review
IS - 1
ER -