Vanessa A Baird
Biographic Data
| ID | 1231485 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Vanessa A Baird |
| GIVEN NAMES | Vanessa A |
| FAMILY NAME | Baird |
| SIGNATURE | BAIRD V A |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Colorado Boulder |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 13 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 493 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 13 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1998 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2021 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
Why Some Blame Politics for Their Personal Problems
Why do some people blame the political system for the problems in their lives? We explore the origins of these grievances and how people assign responsibility and blame for the challenges they face. We propose that individual differences in the personality traits of locus of control and self-esteem help explain why some blame the political system for their personal problems. Using responses from a module of the 2016 Cooperative Congressional Elec…
Linguistic Recognition as a Source of Confidence in the Justice System
How does linguistic recognition in the courtroom affect popular confidence in the justice system among minorities? The authors argue (a) the recognition of either a minority language and/or a third-party’s language (lingua franca) during judicial proceedings increases confidence levels but (b) the use of a lingua franca is more effective. This is because minorities are more likely to favor an arrangement that levels the playing field by having ev…
The Surprisingly Nonviolent Aftermath of the Beslan School Hostage Taking
The horrific 2004 hostage taking in Beslan, North Ossetia, was widely expected to provoke retaliatory violence by ethnic Ossetians against ethnic Ingush and Chechens. The peaceful political activism that ensued suggests a key to breaking the cycle of ethnic violence
Taking a Step Back
We propose that teaching critical thinking is the most important job of teachers in the political science profession. Yet political scientists rarely engage with one another about the specific assignments used to teach critical thinking. This article is the beginning of what we hope will become a dialogue on how to best teach students to think critically. We make a few recommendations for assignments that aim to make students think critically wit…
The Effects of National and Local Funding on Judicial Performance
Courts that perform well are the cornerstone of the rule of law and democratic development. When courts are perceived as legalistic, fair, impartial, and independent of the influence of extrajudicial actors, aggrieved individuals are more likely to pursue litigation over other, potentially unlawful, alternatives. Using original data from surveys of more than 1,800 randomly sampled lawyers in 12 Russian cities, we investigate the effects of percei…
The Persuasive Power of Russian Courts
Given the centralization of power in contemporary Russia, can nonexecutive institutions exercise some power, especially institutions such as high courts, which are critical to establishing the rule of law? In particular, can high courts influence the Russian public through their power to persuade? Using experiments embedded in three surveys of more than 6,000 Russians each, the authors find that the Supreme and Constitutional Courts, as well as t…
Who Sues Government
Courts can better protect rights when citizens are willing and able to litigate in response to government abuses of power. However, if people are not socialized to the possibility of litigating against governments, why do some individuals decide to litigate? Using an original survey of victims in the Moscow theater hostage incident, we find that litigants in a postcommunist context are motivated by political disadvantage, defined as their percept…
Of Time and Causality
Using survey data from The Civic Culture study, this research note revisits the idea that institutional development across the regions of Italy differs because of varying levels of social capital. The findings indicate that – according to the earliest survey data available from Italy – it is unlikely that differences in the development of regional institutions between the North and the South were a result of differences in social capital between …
Shattering the Myth of Legality
The tendency of the media to depict the Supreme Court as inherently apolitical, some scholars argue, is part of the reason that many believe in the “myth of legality” in which the Court is perceived to operate above the ideological skirmishes of everyday politics. Our experimental analyses show that citizens react more negatively to press reports of a politically motivated Court than they do to coverage portraying a Court that strictly follows le…
The Effect of Politically Salient Decisions on the U.S. Supreme Court's Agenda
The U.S. Supreme Court is widely recognized as setting its agenda by choosing to hear certain cases and refusing to hear others. But what influence, if any, does the Court have on the types of cases that are appealed to it? The Court has no formal power to solicit cases, but I contend that potential litigants interpret politically salient Court decisions as signals of its willingness to hear additional cases in certain policy areas. When this hap…
Building Institutional Legitimacy
Building Institutional Legitiimacy
Hibbing and Theiss-Morse (1995: 158, 161) present legislatures as ‘easily the most vulnerable institution[s]’ because of the public's ‘lack of appreciation for the messiness inherent in democratic processes.’ Their finding, along with the evidence of the popularity of national high courts, implies that one possible source of support for courts might emanate from something particular about judicial procedures. However, empirical support for the id…
On the Legitimacy of National High Courts
The purpose of this research is to examine theories of diffuse support and institutional legitimacy by testing hypotheses about the interrelationships among the salience of courts, satisfaction with court outputs, and diffuse support for national high courts. Like our predecessors, we are constrained by essentially cross-sectional data; unlike them, we analyze mass attitudes toward high courts in eighteen countries. Because our sample includes ma…
On the Legitimacy of National High Courts
The purpose of this research is to examine theories of diffuse support and institutional legitimacy by testing hypotheses about the interrelationships among the salience of courts, satisfaction with court outputs, and diffuse support for national high courts. Like our predecessors, we are constrained by essentially cross-sectional data; unlike them, we analyze mass attitudes toward high courts in eighteen countries. Because our sample includes ma…
Shattering the Myth of Legality
The tendency of the media to depict the Supreme Court as inherently apolitical, some scholars argue, is part of the reason that many believe in the “myth of legality” in which the Court is perceived to operate above the ideological skirmishes of everyday politics. Our experimental analyses show that citizens react more negatively to press reports of a politically motivated Court than they do to coverage portraying a Court that strictly follows le…
Building Institutional Legitiimacy
Hibbing and Theiss-Morse (1995: 158, 161) present legislatures as ‘easily the most vulnerable institution[s]’ because of the public's ‘lack of appreciation for the messiness inherent in democratic processes.’ Their finding, along with the evidence of the popularity of national high courts, implies that one possible source of support for courts might emanate from something particular about judicial procedures. However, empirical support for the id…
The Effect of Politically Salient Decisions on the U.S. Supreme Court's Agenda
The U.S. Supreme Court is widely recognized as setting its agenda by choosing to hear certain cases and refusing to hear others. But what influence, if any, does the Court have on the types of cases that are appealed to it? The Court has no formal power to solicit cases, but I contend that potential litigants interpret politically salient Court decisions as signals of its willingness to hear additional cases in certain policy areas. When this hap…
Building Institutional Legitimacy
Linguistic Recognition as a Source of Confidence in the Justice System
How does linguistic recognition in the courtroom affect popular confidence in the justice system among minorities? The authors argue (a) the recognition of either a minority language and/or a third-party’s language (lingua franca) during judicial proceedings increases confidence levels but (b) the use of a lingua franca is more effective. This is because minorities are more likely to favor an arrangement that levels the playing field by having ev…
Of Time and Causality
Using survey data from The Civic Culture study, this research note revisits the idea that institutional development across the regions of Italy differs because of varying levels of social capital. The findings indicate that – according to the earliest survey data available from Italy – it is unlikely that differences in the development of regional institutions between the North and the South were a result of differences in social capital between …
The Persuasive Power of Russian Courts
Given the centralization of power in contemporary Russia, can nonexecutive institutions exercise some power, especially institutions such as high courts, which are critical to establishing the rule of law? In particular, can high courts influence the Russian public through their power to persuade? Using experiments embedded in three surveys of more than 6,000 Russians each, the authors find that the Supreme and Constitutional Courts, as well as t…
Who Sues Government
Courts can better protect rights when citizens are willing and able to litigate in response to government abuses of power. However, if people are not socialized to the possibility of litigating against governments, why do some individuals decide to litigate? Using an original survey of victims in the Moscow theater hostage incident, we find that litigants in a postcommunist context are motivated by political disadvantage, defined as their percept…
Why Some Blame Politics for Their Personal Problems
Why do some people blame the political system for the problems in their lives? We explore the origins of these grievances and how people assign responsibility and blame for the challenges they face. We propose that individual differences in the personality traits of locus of control and self-esteem help explain why some blame the political system for their personal problems. Using responses from a module of the 2016 Cooperative Congressional Elec…
The Effects of National and Local Funding on Judicial Performance
Courts that perform well are the cornerstone of the rule of law and democratic development. When courts are perceived as legalistic, fair, impartial, and independent of the influence of extrajudicial actors, aggrieved individuals are more likely to pursue litigation over other, potentially unlawful, alternatives. Using original data from surveys of more than 1,800 randomly sampled lawyers in 12 Russian cities, we investigate the effects of percei…
On the Legitimacy of National High Courts
The purpose of this research is to examine theories of diffuse support and institutional legitimacy by testing hypotheses about the interrelationships among the salience of courts, satisfaction with court outputs, and diffuse support for national high courts. Like our predecessors, we are constrained by essentially cross-sectional data; unlike them, we analyze mass attitudes toward high courts in eighteen countries. Because our sample includes ma…
Building Institutional Legitimacy
Building Institutional Legitiimacy
Hibbing and Theiss-Morse (1995: 158, 161) present legislatures as ‘easily the most vulnerable institution[s]’ because of the public's ‘lack of appreciation for the messiness inherent in democratic processes.’ Their finding, along with the evidence of the popularity of national high courts, implies that one possible source of support for courts might emanate from something particular about judicial procedures. However, empirical support for the id…
The Effect of Politically Salient Decisions on the U.S. Supreme Court's Agenda
The U.S. Supreme Court is widely recognized as setting its agenda by choosing to hear certain cases and refusing to hear others. But what influence, if any, does the Court have on the types of cases that are appealed to it? The Court has no formal power to solicit cases, but I contend that potential litigants interpret politically salient Court decisions as signals of its willingness to hear additional cases in certain policy areas. When this hap…
Of Time and Causality
Using survey data from The Civic Culture study, this research note revisits the idea that institutional development across the regions of Italy differs because of varying levels of social capital. The findings indicate that – according to the earliest survey data available from Italy – it is unlikely that differences in the development of regional institutions between the North and the South were a result of differences in social capital between …
Shattering the Myth of Legality
The tendency of the media to depict the Supreme Court as inherently apolitical, some scholars argue, is part of the reason that many believe in the “myth of legality” in which the Court is perceived to operate above the ideological skirmishes of everyday politics. Our experimental analyses show that citizens react more negatively to press reports of a politically motivated Court than they do to coverage portraying a Court that strictly follows le…
The Persuasive Power of Russian Courts
Given the centralization of power in contemporary Russia, can nonexecutive institutions exercise some power, especially institutions such as high courts, which are critical to establishing the rule of law? In particular, can high courts influence the Russian public through their power to persuade? Using experiments embedded in three surveys of more than 6,000 Russians each, the authors find that the Supreme and Constitutional Courts, as well as t…
Who Sues Government
Courts can better protect rights when citizens are willing and able to litigate in response to government abuses of power. However, if people are not socialized to the possibility of litigating against governments, why do some individuals decide to litigate? Using an original survey of victims in the Moscow theater hostage incident, we find that litigants in a postcommunist context are motivated by political disadvantage, defined as their percept…
The Effects of National and Local Funding on Judicial Performance
Courts that perform well are the cornerstone of the rule of law and democratic development. When courts are perceived as legalistic, fair, impartial, and independent of the influence of extrajudicial actors, aggrieved individuals are more likely to pursue litigation over other, potentially unlawful, alternatives. Using original data from surveys of more than 1,800 randomly sampled lawyers in 12 Russian cities, we investigate the effects of percei…
The Surprisingly Nonviolent Aftermath of the Beslan School Hostage Taking
The horrific 2004 hostage taking in Beslan, North Ossetia, was widely expected to provoke retaliatory violence by ethnic Ossetians against ethnic Ingush and Chechens. The peaceful political activism that ensued suggests a key to breaking the cycle of ethnic violence
Taking a Step Back
We propose that teaching critical thinking is the most important job of teachers in the political science profession. Yet political scientists rarely engage with one another about the specific assignments used to teach critical thinking. This article is the beginning of what we hope will become a dialogue on how to best teach students to think critically. We make a few recommendations for assignments that aim to make students think critically wit…
Linguistic Recognition as a Source of Confidence in the Justice System
How does linguistic recognition in the courtroom affect popular confidence in the justice system among minorities? The authors argue (a) the recognition of either a minority language and/or a third-party’s language (lingua franca) during judicial proceedings increases confidence levels but (b) the use of a lingua franca is more effective. This is because minorities are more likely to favor an arrangement that levels the playing field by having ev…
Why Some Blame Politics for Their Personal Problems
Why do some people blame the political system for the problems in their lives? We explore the origins of these grievances and how people assign responsibility and blame for the challenges they face. We propose that individual differences in the personality traits of locus of control and self-esteem help explain why some blame the political system for their personal problems. Using responses from a module of the 2016 Cooperative Congressional Elec…
Political science (13 works) · Law (12 works) · Law (10 works) · Politics (10 works) · Judicial and Constitutional Studies (9 works) · Psychology (9 works) · Sociology (9 works) · Law, Economics, and Judicial Systems (5 works) · Perception (5 works) · Law and economics (4 works)