Elections as Focusing Events

Explaining Attitudes Toward the Police and the Government in Comparative Perspective

Bibliographic Data

ID5106331
AuthorsLee Demetrius Walker (0000-0003-0768-310X, University of South Carolina), Richard W Waterman (University of Kentucky)
Year2008
Volume42
Issue2
Pages337-366
Publication date2008-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueLaw & Society Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0023-9216 • E-ISSN: 1540-5893
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1111/j.1540-5893.2008.00344.x
OpenAlexW2031192839
LanguageEN
Citations received9
References cited46

Traditional views hold that citizens' attitudes toward the police are driven by local concerns. We contend that public attitudes toward the police are responsive to systematic and periodic national-level political factors. In particular, we show that national elections as a focusing event alter periodically the determinants of attitudes toward the police. Using a logistic regression model and diachronic data from Costa Rica, Mexico, and the United States, we find that attitudes toward the police and the national government are linked, and this linkage is responsive to the influence of national election campaigns in varying degrees. In addition, we find that attitudes toward the Mexican police are sensitive to partisan changes in the composition of the national political government. We find no such sensitivity in the police attitudes of Costa Rican and U.S. citizens. This suggests that police attitudes are not only affected by the performance of the national political government but also by the character (consolidated versus unconsolidated) of the national political government. In short, police attitudes in new democracies are an indication of the unconsolidated nature of the state apparatus

Government (linguistics · National election · Perspective (graphical · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Public opinion · Sociology · State (computer science · Survey data collection · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Law · Policing Practices and Perceptions · Public Administration · Wildlife Conservation and Criminology Analyses

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