Raymond J La Raja
Biographic Data
| ID | 1535656 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Raymond J La Raja |
| GIVEN NAMES | Raymond J |
| FAMILY NAME | La Raja |
| SIGNATURE | LA RAJA R J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Massachusetts Amherst |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9898-5156 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 27 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 142 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 26 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2004 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
The 2024 U.S. Presidential Election: Public Opinion on the Economy and Immigration Helped Return Trump to the White House, but with No Clear Policy Mandate
We use data from three nationally representative surveys conducted by the University of Massachusetts Amherst Poll in the months leading up to the 2024 general election to provide a data-driven foundation for discussion about the factors contributing to the 2024 presidential election results. Although we do not claim to causally identify any one driver of the election outcome, our polls provide insights about public opinion reflecting the context…
Election reform and campaign finance: Did Alaska's top 4 nonpartisan primaries and ranked‐choice general elections affect political spending
Objective Ranked‐choice voting (RCV) is increasingly seen as a way to reduce political polarization and increase voter choice in elections, but little is known about its effect on candidate fundraising. In 2022, Alaska held its first election using a nonpartisan Top 4 primary followed by a ranked‐choice general election. We analyze the effect of this new system on campaign financing practices in state legislative elections. There are many reasons…
Are local policy attitudes distinct
Scholars disagree as to whether Americans’ attitudes toward local issues are structured ideologically and whether these are related to national policy ideology. We use two surveys of American adults to assess whether and to what extent Americans' local policy attitudes exhibit a similar structure as do national policy attitudes. We find that items asking about local policy are just as likely to reflect a latent dimension of policy preferences as …
Rooted in Racism? Race, Partisanship, Status Threat, and Public Opinion Toward Statehood for Washington, D.C
In recent years, a number of prominent elected officials on both sides of the partisan divide have weighed in on the possibility of making Washington, D.C., the nation’s fifty-first state. While Democratic supporters of statehood for D.C. emphasize issues of equal representation, some Republican opponents have stressed the partisan and ideological consequences of D.C. statehood. Other Republican opponents, in justifying their position, have made …
The Conservative Bias in America’s Local Governments
CANONICAL THEORIES OF REPRESENTATION in American politics argue that politicians seek to represent the median voter, and empirical findings generally demonstrate the responsiveness of elected officials to public opinion.1 However, recent research on inequality in representation provides convincing indications of a pervasive conservative bias among elected officials, particularly on economic issues. Strong evidence now suggests that more affluent …
Who should decide the party’s nominee? Understanding public attitudes toward primary elections
Primary elections in the United States reflect the most inclusive nomination process among political parties across democracies. The desire for mass participation in party nominations appears embedded in a widespread populist ideal. It remains unclear, however, the extent to which voters believe that elites should be able to influence the process. Using data from the 2018 Cooperative Congressional Election Study, we demonstrate that levels of pol…
Hometown Inequality: Race, Class, and Representation in American Local Politics
Local governments play a central role in American democracy, providing essential services such as policing, water, and sanitation. Moreover, Americans express great confidence in their municipal governments. But is this confidence warranted? Using big data and a representative sample of American communities, this book provides the first systematic examination of racial and class inequalities in local politics. We find that non-whites and less-aff…
Detecting and Understanding Donor Strategies in Midterm Elections
What explains how political donors decide where to give? Existing research indicates that people donate money to express support for a preferred political “team” and enjoy the emotional benefits of participating in politics. While this explains why people donate, it does little to help understand the different strategies that donors may pursue. In this paper, we use data on individual decisions as to where to allocate contributions to provide fre…
Campaign Finance and Political Polarization: When Purists Prevail
Efforts to reform the U.S. campaign finance system typically focus on the corrupting influence of large contributions. Yet, as Raymond J. La Raja and Brian F. Schaffner argue, reforms aimed at cutting the flow of money into politics have unintentionally favored candidates with extreme ideological agendas and, consequently, fostered political polarization.\nDrawing on data from 50 states and the U.S. Congress over 20 years, La Raja and Schaffner r…
The Fates of Challengers in U.S. House Elections: The Role of Extended Party Networks in Supporting Candidates and Shaping Electoral Outcomes
Extended party network (EPN) theory characterizes political parties in the United States as dynamic networks of interest groups that collaboratively support favored candidates for office. Electoral predictions derived from EPN theory have yet to be tested on a large sample of races. We operationalize EPNs in the context of organized interest contributions to U.S. House campaigns. We deduce that support by a partisan community of interests signals…
Money in the 2014 Congressional Elections: Institutionalizing a Broken Regulatory System
The campaign finance system has fragmented campaign activity in response to rules that are unworkable in a strong party system. The 2014 congressional elections illustrate how party coalitions have adapted to practices that enable them to raise and spend money outside this formal regulatory framework. For several election cycles, partisan interest groups have used outside campaign organizations to circumvent rules that constrain candidate and par…
Political Participation and Civic Courage: The Negative Effect of Transparency on Making Small Campaign Contributions
The effects of campaign finance spending bans on electoral outcomes: Evidence from the states about the potential impact of Citizens United v. FEC
New Directions in American Politics
New Directions in American Politics introduces students not just to how the American political system works but also to how political science works. La Raja brings together top scholars to write original essays across the standard curriculum of American government and politics, capturing emerging research in the discipline in a way that is accessible for undergraduates. Each chapter combines substantive knowledge with the kind of skill-building a…
Why Super PACs: How the American Party System Outgrew the Campaign Finance System
The growth of political spending by outside groups reflects the demise of a campaign finance system that was designed during an era when candidates largely controlled their electoral destinies. The original 1974 law assumed a candidate-centered framework in which political parties mattered less as sources of electoral support. Since the 1980s, partisan polarization and intense competition for control of government has pushed the candidate-centere…
Richer Parties, Better Politics? Party-Centered Campaign Finance Laws and American Democracy
Would “party-centered” campaign finance laws that channel money primarily through party organizations improve American politics? Scholars have long argued that political parties are essential mediating institutions in a democracy. Yet in comparison to other democracies, American campaign finance laws have been designed to be “candidate-centered.” Constraints on political parties have also created opportunities for interest groups to engage direct…
Don’t Blame Donors for Ideological Polarization of Political Parties: Ideological Change and Stability Among Political Contributors, 1972-2008
Are campaign contributors to parties and candidates in the United States becoming more ideological? Popular and scholarly accounts suggest that political contributors have disproportionate influence in politics, which suggests an important role for them in shaping party ideology and widening the divide between the major American parties. Using the American National Election Studies (ANES) time series data from 1972 to 2008, we find that although …
Explaining the unpopularity of public funding for congressional elections
Party Nominating Procedures and Recruitment—State and Local Level
This article explores the roles that parties play in state and local nominations and the research on those roles, finding a relative dearth of scholarship despite the opportunities for important comparative work. It specifically analyzes how the selection process affects who runs for office. It also investigates political parties, asking how the selection process affects the distribution of power in the organization, its ideological coherence, an…
Election Issue and Blog Discussion
This is our election issue of The Forum. Two articles consider fundamental demographic influences on the 2008 election: Paul Sniderman and Edward Stiglitz on race and the vote, and David Kimball on interest groups and the campaign. Two articles consider fundamental procedural influences: Byron Shafer and Amber Wichowsky on the nominations and the election, and Michael McDonald on voter turnout. Two articles consider major substantive influences o…
The Politics of Immigration Reform
The immigration issue seems insistently with us in the late 2000s, though immigration policy seems persistently elusive. Seeking an intellectual handle on this disjunction, a cluster of Forum authors focus on immigration politics in its many forms. Daniel Tichenor maps the difficult terrain for policymaking in this realm, while Ben Marquez and John Witte address alternative congressional strategies for making immigration policy. Randall Hansen lo…
The Obama Administration: Setting Up a Government
This issue of The Forum brings a focus on elements shaping the new presidential administration. One cluster of articles concentrates on key influences going into the Obama Administration: Wendy Cho and James Gimpel on the differential influences from an economic meltdown; Charles O. Jones on the place of prior political experiences; Todd Estes on lessons from the beginnings of the Clinton Administration; Casey Dominquez on the mandate and the hon…
Redistricting: Reading Between the Lines
The redistricting process evokes major questions about representative democracy, fairness, and political accountability. This article covers the state of the field along three dimensions. First, it explains how redistricting bears on questions about racial and minority representation. Second, it examines how redistricting influences electoral competition, focusing on the alleged power of partisans and incumbents to draw maps that eliminate all bu…
From Bad to Worse: The Unraveling of the Campaign Finance System
This article argues that the campaign finance system has deteriorated under the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA). The system retains the vices of the former regime while jettisoning its virtues. Although successful at banning national party soft money, achieving this narrow goal has come at high cost. Significant problems remain or worsen including the time politicians spend fundraising, the unfair distribution of campaign money, and arrange…
Special Issue: The Politics of Presidential Selection
What Do We (Think We) Know about the Politics of Presidential Selection? For this special issue, the Editors asked an array of political scientists, not so much to predict the outcome of the 2008 nominating contests - though we did invite everyone to take a flyer on that one - but to set out what we think we now know about the politics of presidential selection, that is, the fundamentals of this politics that are now more or less invariant. In pu…
The Fates of Challengers in U.S. House Elections: The Role of Extended Party Networks in Supporting Candidates and Shaping Electoral Outcomes
Extended party network (EPN) theory characterizes political parties in the United States as dynamic networks of interest groups that collaboratively support favored candidates for office. Electoral predictions derived from EPN theory have yet to be tested on a large sample of races. We operationalize EPNs in the context of organized interest contributions to U.S. House campaigns. We deduce that support by a partisan community of interests signals…
The effects of campaign finance spending bans on electoral outcomes: Evidence from the states about the potential impact of Citizens United v. FEC
Detecting and Understanding Donor Strategies in Midterm Elections
What explains how political donors decide where to give? Existing research indicates that people donate money to express support for a preferred political “team” and enjoy the emotional benefits of participating in politics. While this explains why people donate, it does little to help understand the different strategies that donors may pursue. In this paper, we use data on individual decisions as to where to allocate contributions to provide fre…
Who Gave Soft Money? The Effect of Interest Group Resources on Political Contributions
We consider the effect of various organizational resources on political contributions. Using a unique data set of soft money contributors from 1997 to 1998, our resource-based model examines how capital, membership, and experience influence the decision to give money to political parties. By observing decision making in a relatively unconstrained regulatory environment typified by the soft money regime, we demonstrate the conventional wisdom that…
Don’t Blame Donors for Ideological Polarization of Political Parties: Ideological Change and Stability Among Political Contributors, 1972-2008
Are campaign contributors to parties and candidates in the United States becoming more ideological? Popular and scholarly accounts suggest that political contributors have disproportionate influence in politics, which suggests an important role for them in shaping party ideology and widening the divide between the major American parties. Using the American National Election Studies (ANES) time series data from 1972 to 2008, we find that although …
Term Limits, Campaign Contributions, and the Distribution of Power in State Legislatures
Using campaign contributions to legislators as an indicator of member influence, we explore the impact of term limits on the distribution of power within state legislatures. Specifically, we perform a cross‐state comparison of the relative influence of party caucus leaders, committee chairs, and rank‐and‐file legislators before and after term limits. The results indicate that term limits diffuse power in state legislatures, both by decreasing ave…
Political Participation and Civic Courage: The Negative Effect of Transparency on Making Small Campaign Contributions
Money in the 2014 Congressional Elections: Institutionalizing a Broken Regulatory System
The campaign finance system has fragmented campaign activity in response to rules that are unworkable in a strong party system. The 2014 congressional elections illustrate how party coalitions have adapted to practices that enable them to raise and spend money outside this formal regulatory framework. For several election cycles, partisan interest groups have used outside campaign organizations to circumvent rules that constrain candidate and par…
Redistricting: Reading Between the Lines
The redistricting process evokes major questions about representative democracy, fairness, and political accountability. This article covers the state of the field along three dimensions. First, it explains how redistricting bears on questions about racial and minority representation. Second, it examines how redistricting influences electoral competition, focusing on the alleged power of partisans and incumbents to draw maps that eliminate all bu…
Rooted in Racism? Race, Partisanship, Status Threat, and Public Opinion Toward Statehood for Washington, D.C
In recent years, a number of prominent elected officials on both sides of the partisan divide have weighed in on the possibility of making Washington, D.C., the nation’s fifty-first state. While Democratic supporters of statehood for D.C. emphasize issues of equal representation, some Republican opponents have stressed the partisan and ideological consequences of D.C. statehood. Other Republican opponents, in justifying their position, have made …
Who should decide the party’s nominee? Understanding public attitudes toward primary elections
Primary elections in the United States reflect the most inclusive nomination process among political parties across democracies. The desire for mass participation in party nominations appears embedded in a widespread populist ideal. It remains unclear, however, the extent to which voters believe that elites should be able to influence the process. Using data from the 2018 Cooperative Congressional Election Study, we demonstrate that levels of pol…
Richer Parties, Better Politics? Party-Centered Campaign Finance Laws and American Democracy
Would “party-centered” campaign finance laws that channel money primarily through party organizations improve American politics? Scholars have long argued that political parties are essential mediating institutions in a democracy. Yet in comparison to other democracies, American campaign finance laws have been designed to be “candidate-centered.” Constraints on political parties have also created opportunities for interest groups to engage direct…
Why Super PACs: How the American Party System Outgrew the Campaign Finance System
The growth of political spending by outside groups reflects the demise of a campaign finance system that was designed during an era when candidates largely controlled their electoral destinies. The original 1974 law assumed a candidate-centered framework in which political parties mattered less as sources of electoral support. Since the 1980s, partisan polarization and intense competition for control of government has pushed the candidate-centere…
From Bad to Worse: The Unraveling of the Campaign Finance System
This article argues that the campaign finance system has deteriorated under the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA). The system retains the vices of the former regime while jettisoning its virtues. Although successful at banning national party soft money, achieving this narrow goal has come at high cost. Significant problems remain or worsen including the time politicians spend fundraising, the unfair distribution of campaign money, and arrange…
Are local policy attitudes distinct
Scholars disagree as to whether Americans’ attitudes toward local issues are structured ideologically and whether these are related to national policy ideology. We use two surveys of American adults to assess whether and to what extent Americans' local policy attitudes exhibit a similar structure as do national policy attitudes. We find that items asking about local policy are just as likely to reflect a latent dimension of policy preferences as …
Who Gave Soft Money? The Effect of Interest Group Resources on Political Contributions
We consider the effect of various organizational resources on political contributions. Using a unique data set of soft money contributors from 1997 to 1998, our resource-based model examines how capital, membership, and experience influence the decision to give money to political parties. By observing decision making in a relatively unconstrained regulatory environment typified by the soft money regime, we demonstrate the conventional wisdom that…
Term Limits, Campaign Contributions, and the Distribution of Power in State Legislatures
Using campaign contributions to legislators as an indicator of member influence, we explore the impact of term limits on the distribution of power within state legislatures. Specifically, we perform a cross‐state comparison of the relative influence of party caucus leaders, committee chairs, and rank‐and‐file legislators before and after term limits. The results indicate that term limits diffuse power in state legislatures, both by decreasing ave…
From Bad to Worse: The Unraveling of the Campaign Finance System
This article argues that the campaign finance system has deteriorated under the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA). The system retains the vices of the former regime while jettisoning its virtues. Although successful at banning national party soft money, achieving this narrow goal has come at high cost. Significant problems remain or worsen including the time politicians spend fundraising, the unfair distribution of campaign money, and arrange…
Special Issue: The Politics of Presidential Selection
What Do We (Think We) Know about the Politics of Presidential Selection? For this special issue, the Editors asked an array of political scientists, not so much to predict the outcome of the 2008 nominating contests - though we did invite everyone to take a flyer on that one - but to set out what we think we now know about the politics of presidential selection, that is, the fundamentals of this politics that are now more or less invariant. In pu…
Election Issue and Blog Discussion
This is our election issue of The Forum. Two articles consider fundamental demographic influences on the 2008 election: Paul Sniderman and Edward Stiglitz on race and the vote, and David Kimball on interest groups and the campaign. Two articles consider fundamental procedural influences: Byron Shafer and Amber Wichowsky on the nominations and the election, and Michael McDonald on voter turnout. Two articles consider major substantive influences o…
The Politics of Immigration Reform
The immigration issue seems insistently with us in the late 2000s, though immigration policy seems persistently elusive. Seeking an intellectual handle on this disjunction, a cluster of Forum authors focus on immigration politics in its many forms. Daniel Tichenor maps the difficult terrain for policymaking in this realm, while Ben Marquez and John Witte address alternative congressional strategies for making immigration policy. Randall Hansen lo…
The Obama Administration: Setting Up a Government
This issue of The Forum brings a focus on elements shaping the new presidential administration. One cluster of articles concentrates on key influences going into the Obama Administration: Wendy Cho and James Gimpel on the differential influences from an economic meltdown; Charles O. Jones on the place of prior political experiences; Todd Estes on lessons from the beginnings of the Clinton Administration; Casey Dominquez on the mandate and the hon…
Redistricting: Reading Between the Lines
The redistricting process evokes major questions about representative democracy, fairness, and political accountability. This article covers the state of the field along three dimensions. First, it explains how redistricting bears on questions about racial and minority representation. Second, it examines how redistricting influences electoral competition, focusing on the alleged power of partisans and incumbents to draw maps that eliminate all bu…
Party Nominating Procedures and Recruitment—State and Local Level
This article explores the roles that parties play in state and local nominations and the research on those roles, finding a relative dearth of scholarship despite the opportunities for important comparative work. It specifically analyzes how the selection process affects who runs for office. It also investigates political parties, asking how the selection process affects the distribution of power in the organization, its ideological coherence, an…
Explaining the unpopularity of public funding for congressional elections
Don’t Blame Donors for Ideological Polarization of Political Parties: Ideological Change and Stability Among Political Contributors, 1972-2008
Are campaign contributors to parties and candidates in the United States becoming more ideological? Popular and scholarly accounts suggest that political contributors have disproportionate influence in politics, which suggests an important role for them in shaping party ideology and widening the divide between the major American parties. Using the American National Election Studies (ANES) time series data from 1972 to 2008, we find that although …
New Directions in American Politics
New Directions in American Politics introduces students not just to how the American political system works but also to how political science works. La Raja brings together top scholars to write original essays across the standard curriculum of American government and politics, capturing emerging research in the discipline in a way that is accessible for undergraduates. Each chapter combines substantive knowledge with the kind of skill-building a…
Why Super PACs: How the American Party System Outgrew the Campaign Finance System
The growth of political spending by outside groups reflects the demise of a campaign finance system that was designed during an era when candidates largely controlled their electoral destinies. The original 1974 law assumed a candidate-centered framework in which political parties mattered less as sources of electoral support. Since the 1980s, partisan polarization and intense competition for control of government has pushed the candidate-centere…
Richer Parties, Better Politics? Party-Centered Campaign Finance Laws and American Democracy
Would “party-centered” campaign finance laws that channel money primarily through party organizations improve American politics? Scholars have long argued that political parties are essential mediating institutions in a democracy. Yet in comparison to other democracies, American campaign finance laws have been designed to be “candidate-centered.” Constraints on political parties have also created opportunities for interest groups to engage direct…
Money in the 2014 Congressional Elections: Institutionalizing a Broken Regulatory System
The campaign finance system has fragmented campaign activity in response to rules that are unworkable in a strong party system. The 2014 congressional elections illustrate how party coalitions have adapted to practices that enable them to raise and spend money outside this formal regulatory framework. For several election cycles, partisan interest groups have used outside campaign organizations to circumvent rules that constrain candidate and par…
Political Participation and Civic Courage: The Negative Effect of Transparency on Making Small Campaign Contributions
The effects of campaign finance spending bans on electoral outcomes: Evidence from the states about the potential impact of Citizens United v. FEC
Campaign Finance and Political Polarization: When Purists Prevail
Efforts to reform the U.S. campaign finance system typically focus on the corrupting influence of large contributions. Yet, as Raymond J. La Raja and Brian F. Schaffner argue, reforms aimed at cutting the flow of money into politics have unintentionally favored candidates with extreme ideological agendas and, consequently, fostered political polarization.\nDrawing on data from 50 states and the U.S. Congress over 20 years, La Raja and Schaffner r…
The Fates of Challengers in U.S. House Elections: The Role of Extended Party Networks in Supporting Candidates and Shaping Electoral Outcomes
Extended party network (EPN) theory characterizes political parties in the United States as dynamic networks of interest groups that collaboratively support favored candidates for office. Electoral predictions derived from EPN theory have yet to be tested on a large sample of races. We operationalize EPNs in the context of organized interest contributions to U.S. House campaigns. We deduce that support by a partisan community of interests signals…
Detecting and Understanding Donor Strategies in Midterm Elections
What explains how political donors decide where to give? Existing research indicates that people donate money to express support for a preferred political “team” and enjoy the emotional benefits of participating in politics. While this explains why people donate, it does little to help understand the different strategies that donors may pursue. In this paper, we use data on individual decisions as to where to allocate contributions to provide fre…
Hometown Inequality: Race, Class, and Representation in American Local Politics
Local governments play a central role in American democracy, providing essential services such as policing, water, and sanitation. Moreover, Americans express great confidence in their municipal governments. But is this confidence warranted? Using big data and a representative sample of American communities, this book provides the first systematic examination of racial and class inequalities in local politics. We find that non-whites and less-aff…
Who should decide the party’s nominee? Understanding public attitudes toward primary elections
Primary elections in the United States reflect the most inclusive nomination process among political parties across democracies. The desire for mass participation in party nominations appears embedded in a widespread populist ideal. It remains unclear, however, the extent to which voters believe that elites should be able to influence the process. Using data from the 2018 Cooperative Congressional Election Study, we demonstrate that levels of pol…
The Conservative Bias in America’s Local Governments
CANONICAL THEORIES OF REPRESENTATION in American politics argue that politicians seek to represent the median voter, and empirical findings generally demonstrate the responsiveness of elected officials to public opinion.1 However, recent research on inequality in representation provides convincing indications of a pervasive conservative bias among elected officials, particularly on economic issues. Strong evidence now suggests that more affluent …
Rooted in Racism? Race, Partisanship, Status Threat, and Public Opinion Toward Statehood for Washington, D.C
In recent years, a number of prominent elected officials on both sides of the partisan divide have weighed in on the possibility of making Washington, D.C., the nation’s fifty-first state. While Democratic supporters of statehood for D.C. emphasize issues of equal representation, some Republican opponents have stressed the partisan and ideological consequences of D.C. statehood. Other Republican opponents, in justifying their position, have made …
The 2024 U.S. Presidential Election: Public Opinion on the Economy and Immigration Helped Return Trump to the White House, but with No Clear Policy Mandate
We use data from three nationally representative surveys conducted by the University of Massachusetts Amherst Poll in the months leading up to the 2024 general election to provide a data-driven foundation for discussion about the factors contributing to the 2024 presidential election results. Although we do not claim to causally identify any one driver of the election outcome, our polls provide insights about public opinion reflecting the context…
Electoral Systems and Political Participation (25 works) · Politics (24 works) · Political science (23 works) · Law (20 works) · Law (15 works) · Public Administration (15 works) · Political economy (12 works) · Public Administration (12 works) · Economics (11 works) · Campaign finance (10 works)