unit 5 apgov

Unit 5 - Political Participation in Civil Society

Directions: Use the textbook to answer these questions. They go in order. I have noted the beginning of each section to help you answer these more efficiently.

Ch. 13 Questions

1. What are linkage institutions and what role do they serve? (BEGIN 13.1)

• They are channels that connect individuals with government, including elections, political parties, intrest groups, and the media 

• The influence elected officials and citizens 

2. Identify the Constitutional elements and amendments that guarantee franchise and for each explain the specific group enfranchised or how it enfranchised people. (BEGIN 13.2)

• Franchise is the right to vote 

• 26th amendment allows 18 year olds to vote or older 

• 24th amendment prohibits congress from imposing poll taxes as a condition for voting in federal elections

• Poll tax is a payment required by a state or federal government before a citizen is allowed to vote

3. Describe America’s voter turnout compared to the rest of the world and the difference between presidential and midterm elections.

• Voter turnout is the number of eligible voters who participate in an election as a percentage of the total number of eligible voters 

• Only 58% of eligible voters showed up at the polls in the 2016 election 

4. Describe how SES is related to political participation in the general context and specifically for

SES is the measure of an individuals wealth, income, occupation, and educational attainment

1. Age

• Younger people vote at lower rates than older people

2. Race and Ethnic Identity

• Hispanic americans vote less than other americans with other racial and ethnic identies

3. Gender

• Women vote at a higher rate than men 

5. What is GOTV (also on p. 444)?

• Get out the vote which is efforts to mobilize supporters

6. What are the two actions related to voting?

• Registering to vote and casting a ballot

7. What are the different types of voter registration requirements?

• A set of rules that govern who can vote and how, when, and where they vote 

• Showing identification or proof of residency

8. (BEGIN 13.3) Describe each of the following

9. What functions do elections serve other than simply selecting leaders?

• A signal, a way of transmitting information to elected officials about voters preferences and priorities 

10. What are the stages of a presidential campaign? (BEGIN 13.4)

• Before: laying foundations for their bids years before the official process begins, raising money, contacting party officials, trying to win the favor of the party, attracting media coverage, testing the waters, travelling, public opinion polls

• Nomination process:  rules are set for governing the nomination process, parties control most of the details on how the candidate gets nominated, primary elections, national conventions

• General election: after national party convention, nominees are campaigners, polished points and interactions, they now have to appeal undecided voters and independents, maintaining energy and appealing others

11. Describe the function and operation of the Electoral College.

• The electoral college is a constitutionally required process for selecting the president through states of electors chosen in each state, who are pledged to vote for a nominee in the presidential election. 

• Winner take all system is a system of elections in which the candidate who wins the plurality of votes within a state receives all of that states votes in the electoral college. 

• Battleground states is a state where the polls show a close contest between the republican and democratic candidate in a presidential election

• Swing state is a state where levels of support for the parties are similar and elections swing back and forth between democrats and republicans

12. Read through the 13.5 section. The case discussed there, Citizens United, is a required  case.

Ch. 14 Questions

Note: Read the summary of the 2016 election at the beginning. It’s a pretty fair accounting of the race.

1. Briefly describe each of the three roles parties play in our democracy. (BEGIN 14.1)

   1. Organizations: political parties recruit, nominate, and support candidates for political office

2. Electorate: parties provide labels that voters can use as shortcuts in identifying candidates closer to their own political ideologies

3. Government: a party enacts the policy positions of its members and acts as an opposition to the majority party when it is in the minority

2. How do party coalitions help win elections? (Begin 14.2)

• Party coalitions are groups of voters who support a political party overtime 

• Realignment: when the groups of people who support a political party shift their allegiance to a different political party 

• Critical election: a major national election that signals a change in the balance of power between the two parties 

• Party era: time period when one party wins most national elections 

• Era of divided government: a trend since 1969 in which one party controls one or both houses of congress and the president is from the opposing party

3. What is the difference between open and closed primaries? (Begin 14.3)

• Open primary: a primary election in which all eligible voters may vote, regardless of their party affiliation

• Closed primary: a primary election in which only those who have registered as a member of a political party may vote 

4. How are caucuses different from primaries? informal

• A caucus is a process through which a state’s eligible voters meet to select delegates to represent their preferences in the nomination process

• This is different because the voting is done in public instead of by secret ballot

5. How are the parties different in how they award delegates in presidential elections?

• The republican party awards delegates either to winning candidate statewide or splitting delegated between winners in the state overall and winners in individual congressional districts (this is more common)

• The democratic party has tended to award delegates through a proportional system in which delegates are divided based upon total vote share. However, the elite within the democratic party is given special representation, called superdelegates. 

• Superdelegates are members of the democratic party, usually a party leader or activist who is not pledged to a candidate based on the outcome of the states primary or caucus. 

6. How does the schedule of elections matter? (Make sure you get “front-load” in here”)

• Front loading is a decision by a state to push its primary/caucus to a date as early in the election season as possible to gain more influence in the presidential nomination process

• Swing states are important, gaining momentum 

7. What happens at a national convention?

• A meeting where delegates officialy select their partys nominee for the presidency 

• Formal nomination 

8. What’s the difference between a proportional representation and a SMD-plurality system? (Begin 14.4)

• proportional representation system: an election system for a legislature in which citizens  vote for parties, rather than individuals, and parties are represented in the legislature according to the percentage of the vote they receive

• Single member plurality system: an election system for choosing members of the legislature where the winner is the candidate who receives the most votes, even if the candidate does not receive a majority of the votes

9. What do winner-take-all systems lead to?

• It means that democratic and republican parties win almost every office because a candidate from one of the two major parties almost always receives the most votes in a district or state

• Can create more partisanship 

• Leads to only swing states being important

• Less political efficancy 

10. What role do third parties play in US politics?

• Third parties are a minor political party in competition with the two major parties

Ch. 15 - Interest Groups and Social Movements

1. How are interest groups related to Federalist Paper #10? (Begin 15.1)

• Interest groups are voluntary associations of people who come together with the goal of getting the policies that they favor enacted 

• This is related to federalist 10 as madison adresses factions 

2. How are pluralist and elitist theory different?

• Pluarlist theory is a theory that political power is distributed among many competing groups, which means that no single group can grow too powerful 

• Elitist theory is a theory that the wealthy elite class has a disproportionate amount of economic and political power

3. What’s the “free rider” problem and how do interest groups fight it?

• Free riders are individuals who enjoy collective goods and benefit from the actions of an interest group without joining 

• One of the ways is by selective benefits which are benefits only available to those who join the group 

4. What are the different kinds of interest groups? (Begin 15.2)

• Economic: groups advocating on behalf of the financial interests of their members 

• Public: groups that act on behalf of the collective interests of a broad group of individuals 

• Single-issue: associations focusing on one specific area of public policy, often a moral issue about which they are unwilling to compromise 

• Government: organizations acting on behalf of local, state, or foreign governments

5. How do interest groups lobby the legislature?

• Lobbying is interacting with government officials in order to advance a groups public policy goals

• It involves efforts to shape policy across the three branches

6. How do interest groups influence the judiciary?

• They can use amicus curiae brief (friend on the court) is a brief filled by someone who is not a party to a case in an attempt to persuade the court to agree with the arguments set forth in the brief 

• They may also file lawsuits, influence judicial appointments through presidential nominations or senate confirmation process

• Interest groups inclue planned parenthood, the national rifle association, or the national federation of business 

7. How do iron triangles connect interest groups to government?

• Iron triangles which are the coordinated and mutually beneficial activities of the bureaucracy, congress, and interest groups to achieve shared policy goals 

• They use an issue netowrk which is the webs of influence between intreset groups, policymakers, and policy advocates. 

8. What are the tools that interest groups and social movements used in 15.3? (Begin 15.3)

• Protests, civil disobedience, media attention, 

Ch. 16 - Media

1. Why is it hard figuring out exactly what “fake news” means? (Begin 16.0 and 16.1)

• Because to some people it means the intentional use of media to support a political party

• To others it means to intentional presentation of material that the news agency knows to be untrue or unverified

• Or the intentional use of the mass media to deceive the public with the goal of changing political outcomes 

• Or to discredit media stories that are accurate 

• Or the term is uses to discredit the media in general 

2. How could the media engage in agenda setting? 

• Agenda setting is the medias ability to highlight certain issues and bring them to the attention of the public 

• The media preforms 3 important functions, filling out the surveys used to report on political events and outcomes,  interpert those events and outcomes to the public and to educate citizens

3. How has broadcast media changed over the past 50 years?

• It has changed to mass media which is sources of information designed to reach a wide audience, including newspapers, radio, television, and internet outlets 

4. How has regulation of media changed since the 1920? (Begin 16.2)

• Media regulation began with controlling radio in the 1920s, then   fairness rules in the mid-20th century shifted toward deregulation in the 1980s with the rise of digital media.

5. Explain the connection between bias and journalism. (Begin 16.3)

• Media bias occurs when journalists' personal or organizational preferences influence news coverage, shaping public opinion and political discourse.

6. What is horse-race journalism?

•  Horse-race journalism focuses on the competition between candidates, highlighting who’s ahead in the polls and the dynamics of the race, rather than policy issues.