Constructing Publics and Their Opinions

8/21/2019 Constructing Publics and Their Opinions

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Politial Communication Vblum e 10, pp. 101-120 1058-4609/93 10.00 + .00Printed In the UK. All rights reserved. Copyright 1993 Taylor & Francis

Constructing Publics and Their OpinionsW. LANCE BENNETTUniversity of Washington

It is generallyagreedthat public op inion and popu lar sovereignty are thefoun-dations of liberal democracy. In a perfect worid, enlightened citizens wouldhold dialogues w ith their representatives about how to advance the values andpriorities that constitute the electoral mandate. In these dialogues, members ofconstituencies and their elected representatives would share the informationrequired for rational choice and enlightened policymaking. When informationand social conditions change, underlying group structures, ideological codes,and opinion formations would also change in clear and predictable ways. Theresulting opinion shifts would be intelligible to rulers and scholars alike, be-cause in this perfect world , the citizen groups competing for power in govern-ment could be located on a belief-value continuum along which issues andpolicy preferences line up with some ideological if not mathematical precision,in such a state of harmony, politicians would be able to read public opinion asif it were a familiar text.The interesting puzzle surrounding this idealized story or myth about opin-ion and democracy is not so much how little it resembles available reality inmost societies, particularly the United States, but how much it continues toprovide the interpretive backdrop for theory and research on public opinion,particularly in the United States. Because few societies come close to the idea l,and the U nited States falls shorter than most of its industrial democratic peers,the ironic result is that textbooks end up telling students of opinion moreabout what empirically discovered opin ion formations are no t than what theyare made of. The litany of received wisdom about op inion is that it tends to beunstable, unconstrained, uninfo rmed, and not ideological.One begins to suspect that generation after generation of scholars havecontemplated the choice between a pleasing mythology and an unruly realityand adopted the mythology (of sovereign publics witli stable bodies of opin-ion) as a lens for examining the real world, even though that lens does notbring much into focus. Perhaps adopting other analytical assumptions wouldrequire disrupting the idealized de finitions of democratic politics that form thecore paradigms of many subfields of political science and related social sci-ence disciplines. In any event, what we have mainly learned is how little actualpublics conform to their idealized roles. The easy conclusion time and timeagain is that people are poorly informed, unsystematic in their thinking, andnot inclined to join in stable coalitions with large numbers of others to ad-vance broad ideological agendas. A companion assumption often found withthis way of thinking is that elites and relatively small attentive publics are

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702 W Lance Bennettresponsible for what coherence there is in public debate and po licy th ink ing.Also characteristic of mythological thinking, this elitist assumption persistswitho ut much corroborating evidence and groyving bodies of data to the con-trary.Alongside the portrait of an unsophisticated public, there is an importantcounterstory of a public that makes the best sense it can out of a wo rld that isat best selectively represented by elites who do not display much m ore perfec-tion in their op inions than the masses. This academic countermyth ofarationalpublica pub lic that is doing the best it can given the choices and the kinds ofieaders available to itplaces the burden of democratic shortcomings on thesame elites who represent the strength of democracy in the story of the unwor-thy public. In the rational public story, more charitable measures of opinionreveal glimmerings of coherent thinking, and the residual of ignorance andinstability that remains is attributed to leaders whose dissembling rhetoriclowers the level of public discourse.The irony of these mirror-opposite research traditions is that science hasreproduced the leading brands of populist and elitist political common sensein society. Given the opposing nature of the narratives and the impressivemarshaling of academic supporters on both sides, the ultimate question oftruth is reduced to which academic faction holds sway in the influential gradu-ate training programs and on the editorial boards of leading journals; For mostof the past half century, the debate has been dominated by adherents of theunsoph isticated p ub lic school of thought. Whether this dominance is due tosuperior evidence or to more strategic placement of the academic gatekeepersis best left to the eye of the beholder.The more basic p roblem , however, is that most debates in op inion researchdissolve quickly into myth and ideology or into equally irreconcilable ques-tions of methodology and measurement. Whether conducted on an ideologi-cal or methodological plane, debates about the nature of public opinion havebecome irreconcilable because, among other reasons, the concept of opinionitself has become som ething ofanacademic fetish . A fetish is a symbol (in thiscase, the symbols pu bli c and op inion ) abstracted out of messy, ambiguouspolitical settings or contexts and studied in isolation, imbued with importanceand meaning within academically constructed contexts. Like sexual and eco-nomic fetishes built around idealized erotic articles or money, the public opin-ion fetishes of both the p opu list and e litist varieties are sustained precisely bytheir removal from real political contexts and by their continuing reference toidealized understandings. This results in arcane disputes that are often settledunilaterally by discounting the other side's empirical evidence that does not fitthe idealized facts. The result, not surprisingly, is a field in considerable disar-ray, fraught w ith theoretical and methodolog ical problems, and unable to shedmuch light on the basic question of how public opinion does operate politi-cally in everyday American politics.Following a brief review of some of the major paradoxes of mainstreamopinion research, we turn to an alternative way of think ing about op inion andits political dynamics: a symbolic constructionist approach inspired by thework of Murray Edelman. In this approach, we see away around the contradic-tory populist and elitist paradigms in which opinion becomes an abstractedpolitical fetish. The price we pay for this liberation from idealized publics and


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Constructing Publics and Tbeir Opinions 103their elusive opinions may be too steep for those committed to a rational,objective social science epistemology; the recognition that opinion is not theend product of a neatly generalizable rational process. To the contrary, forEdelman, opinion in its political context is a symbolic construct that may ap-pear more or less informed, rational, ideological, or otherwise constraineddepending on the interplay of power and communication motivated by com-peting political strategies. This alternative way of understanding opinion isguided by Edelman's (1992) admonition about public opinion and other formal-ized political entities:

Tbe political entities tbat are most influential upon public con-sciousness and action,then , are fetishes: creations of observers thatthen dominate and mystify their creators. I try here to analyze thepervasive consequences of the fetishism at the core of politics,never a wh olly successful enterprise because it is temp ting t o exor-cise a fetish by constructing a rational theory of politics, (p. 11)The next section examines some of the paradoxes and impasses of opinionresearch that Edelman's perspective anticipates. After that, we review some ofthe promising directions that flow from Edelman's approach and look at theadvantages of stud ying op inio n as a symbolic cons truct situated in always shift-ing political contexts. The concluding section i l lustrates applications of con-structionist perspectives with reference to the work of other scholars who havedemonstrated useful empirical applications of Edelman's assumptions.

Some Paradoxes of Traditional Opinion ResearchThe search for a stable organizing structure underlying public opinion hasproduced over 30 different measures of what might loosely be called politicalsophistication, none of which has proved empirically reliable, much less thebasis fo r a general theory (Neum an, 1986, p. 192). At everyturn,generalizable,predictive models of underlying opinion structure have eluded researchers,yet the response has been to generate new measures or s imply make the bestof bad ones.No topic better illustrates the futile quest for the Holy Grail of opinion thanthe search for underlying ideological structure. If some sort of liberal-conservative ideology prevailed in Am erican political cultu re, so the reasoninggoes, people should be able to recognize its logic and produce opinions tbatreflected this deeper structure. Never mind the fact that many students ofAmerican political culture firmly reject tbe possibility of stable ideological po-larization in what they see as a flu id liberal cu lture(e.g.,Connolly, 1987; Hartz,1953;Kammen, 1980; Rodgers, 1987), tbe search for an idealized public goeson. For those who hold that idealized public to high standards of ideologicalsoph istication, barely10%of respondents can draw distinctions between liber-alism and conservatism that satisfy researchers, and the unsurprising conclu-sion is that the general pubic displays little underlying ideological sophistica-tion (Converse, 1964). For those m ore inclined toward the rational pub lic ideal,there is a tendency to invent ideology tests that are easier to pass, making the


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704 W Lance Bennettmeasurement and manufacture of ideology something of a cottage industryamong behaviorally oriented political scientists. As Neuman (1986) observed:

An important and puzzling question about the linkage between so-phistication and opinion involves the issue of ideology, or whetherand to what extent sophistication leads to conservative or liberalopinions. The term political ideology is to students of mass politicalbehavior what the red flag is to thebull.At the mere mention of theterm scholars flare their nostrils and furrow their brows, ready to dointellectual battle. There is as much controversy and soul-searchingabout the origins and adherence of political ideology in mass pub-lics among researchers as there is about politics among committedideologues, (p. 73)True to this characterization, those co mm itted to showing that the public is

incapable of sophisticated thinking continue to find low levels of ideologicalconstraint operating behind opinions, whereas, in the words of Haltom andZiegler, other scholars operationalize the concept so loosely tha t few sapientlife forms cou ld fail to exh ibit ideo logy (Haltom & Ziegler, 1992, p. 12). As acase in point, they cite Russell Dalton, who recommends using a self-classification scheme that, in Dalton's own words, me rely requires that voterscan locate themselves on a Left/Right scale, without having to articulate themeaning of the scale.Bythis standard, th e vast ma jority of Western publics canbe described as ideo logical (Dalton , 1988, p. 25).All of this leads Haltom and Ziegler to a proposal reminiscent of Edelman'searlier idea about fetishes: Perhaps the search for the deep structure of opin-ion reflects less the dem onstrable empirical or analytical success of any givenapproach than the varying attempts of analysts to reconstitute the politicalwo rld in their own images. Referring to the numerous but seldom reconcileduses of the liberal-conservative continuum, Haltom and Ziegler (1992) say thatwhat appear to be vices when the continuum is regarded as a sys-tem for classification are seen to be virtues when the continuum isreconceived as a means for constructing political reality to suit theend and interests of those who use the continuum. Critics of theliberal-conservative continuum marvel that it survives despite its se-rious flaws. We argue that the liberal-conservative continuum is astandard too l of analysis because its flaws advance its functions,(p.2)

What these observers mean by conceptual and methodological flaws ad-vancing the uses of ideological concepts is simply that analysts are given con-siderable interpretive license by the very imprecision of their concepts and bythe em pirical disputes swirling around them . Those inclined by common senseto see the public as ideological can always find reason to continue to do so,whereas those inclined by comm on sense to see the pub lic as unsophisticatedhave other reasons to advance their claims. All the while, pundits, pollsters,news comm entators, and textbook w riters advance the uses of ideological pub -


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Constructing Publics and Their Opinions 105l ies to impose famil iar, i f i llusory, patterns on otherw ise amb iguous and elusiverealities. Am ong othe r th ings , say Ha ltom and Ziegler (1992),

ideological blocs . . . ease analysis and fulfi l l myths in civics text-books. Elections are considerably more edifying, for example, i f in-terpreters construct groups of voters whose allegiance to a candi-date, party, or policy can be explained by a calculus that strikesacademics and journalists as rational or at least fathomable. Mostinterpreters prefer the democratic process to seem ideologicalrather than stochastic. For all these reasons, the assumption of atleast minimal ideological sophistication is functional and under-standable, i f not empirically defensible, (p. 11)In other words, measuring opinion against idealized standards of order andcoherence allows observers to have the world the way they want it, sometimesfi l led with rational people making intell igible electoral choices or supporting a

responsible leader or point of view and sometimes fi l led with a rabble incapa-ble of reason or responsible judgment. The fluidity and contradictions of basicopinion concepts and measures make it possible for different observers (or thesame observer at different times) to interpret publics both ways. As Edelman(1977, pp. 49-51) has noted, claims about public opinion are themselves politi-cal constructions, and those constructions take on greater rhetorical appealwhen supported by theoretical jargon and scientific evidence, even if thoseconcepts and facts are essential ly contested behind the walls of academe.Thus, it becomes possible for experts to dismiss some opinion formationsas the expressions of ignorant and uncons trained pu blics w hile legitim izingother opinion pol l f indings as credible expressions of knowing individuals.Du ring the 1980s, for exa mple, opinio n po lls consistently op posin g govern-ment interventions in Central America were often discredited by pollsters andacademic experts called on by the press. Meanwhile, polls taken among thesame population at the same time on subjects l ike abortion were routinelypassed along in news reports as legitimate expressions of op inio n. Never min dthat abortion policy raised questions of l i fe and death that had bedeviled theol-ogy, medical science, and the Supreme Court; the public was often cited as acredible source in news about abortion. By contrast, the arguable presence ofstable underlying beliefs respecting the sovereignty of other nations was notenough to warrant frequent or unqual i f ied use of pol ls on Central Americapolicy in news accounts (Bennett, 1989). The po int here is not that a bortio nopinion should have been more heavily discounted or Central America opin-ion more easily credi ted , but that two bodies of op inion f rom the same generalpopulation about the leading issues of the day were represented in dramati-

cally different ways by politicians, academic experts, and journalists. As forhow those different news accounts were constructed, that is another story(Bennett, 1990). The p oint here is that those c onstru ctions clearly used the f ullrange of academic disagreement resulting from failed attempts to discovergeneral patterns in public sophistication.To the extent that representations of opinion appeal to prevail ing yet con-tradictory common sense about the underlying sophistication or lack of so-phistication in the general public, those political constructions appear all the


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706 W Lar)ce Bentiettmore acceptable and natural. Even many of the readers of this article may findit reasonable to co un t opinion about abortion and discount opinion aboutforeign policy. The prevalence of similar dispositions in news audiences makescorresponding representations of public opinion in the daily news equally sen-sible, creating a sort of confirming backdrop of reality (based on availablecommon sense) that joins experts and the people they analyze in a network ofwe ll-know n, if often debated, assumptions. Because the news makes itavirtueto tell two sides of every story, people (whether they be news audiences oracademic experts) are invited to project their preferred images of publics andpolitics onto mediated episodes from the passing stream o f reality. At the sametime, people outside those webs of common sense may feel politically es-tranged from the same public debates in the media. Whether many people areengaged meaningfully by representations of publics and their opinions orwhether many are estranged from those representations, the point remainsthat claims about public opinion are no less politically constructed or anymore objectively true .

The conceptual ambiguity created by continuing attempts to find a generaltheory of public opin ion runs through debates over ideology, information lev-els,and dozens of other measures aimed at finding stable patterns of opinion.A more exhaustive list of the paradoxes resulting from decades of efforts tobuild opinion theory is contained in Neuman (1986), but one additional exam-ple can be offered here to illustrate why the idealization of publics and theiropinions is of little help in unde rstanding the pragmatics of o pinion formationand change.Consider an important implication of the unsophisticated public story. Thefocus of so much attention on an unsophisticated and unstable general publicwould seem to imply that elites, opinion leaders, or some core of more in-formed citizens display the kind of o pinion formations recommended fo r dem-ocratic governance. Indeed, if nobody conforms to the idealized model ofopinion sophistication, it becomes hard to avoid asking what recommends thatmodel to us. However, one of the most troublesome paradoxes cited byNeuman and other observers is that the very standards of political sophistica-tion that are lost on mass publics also generally fail to explain much about e liteopinion . This raises the tricky qu estion of what human p opulation , ifany,thosetheories could possiblyexplain.However, as Neuman argues, neither theopin-ions of general publics nor elites measure up conceptually to the standards ofthis school:

The lack of a meaningful link between political sophistication andopinion holding could be a fluke of some sort, an artifact of theinterview process, or the product ofashared sense of civic m inded-ness in American political culture. The correlation between sophisti-cation and the stability of expressed opinions over time is a morecritical test of the knowledge-opinion link. It is well known thatthere isagreat deal of noise in the measurement process (Converse,1964;Key,1961;Schuman and Presser, 1981). It becomes increasinglyevident to those who have pored over the results of surveys, espe-cially panel surveys, that public opinion consists of some importanttrends of opinion against a background of constant churn. Perhaps


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Constructing Publics atid Tbeir Opinions 107this churn is an inherent and natural Brownian movement ofopin-ion and belief. The key to the model of stratified pluralism [whichcontends that at least elites are sophisticated] is then to find the linkbetween sophistication and opinion stability in that potential elite ofopinion leadership which provides continuity and consistency and,in times of change, exists as the bellweather stratum.

But in this case there is even less evidence of the link. Indeed,there is significant variation. Although the opinions of some respon-dents are much more consistent over time than others, the opinionsof the more sophisticated of the citizenry are not significantly morestable. (Neuman, 1986, p. 61)

Research by John Zailer has further compromised the assumption thatwhere higher levels of information exist, greater sophistication, stability, andindependence of mind will also be found. On a variety of issues, Zailer hasdemonstrated that more informed members of opinion samples tend to bemore responsive to cuing from political elites because those elites are repre-sented in the media. It appears that, far from creating more sophistication andindependence of mind, higher levels of information lead to greater receptivityto elite propaganda (Zailer, 1991).

These and other paradoxes of opinion theory all point to the difficulty ofgeneralizing about publics as though they existed somehow suspended in timeand space, independent of the mass communications processes that act onthem and through which they react on a continuous basis. However, many ofthe paradoxes of public opinion disappear quickly if we alloyv for the possibil-ity that opinion formations change dramatically with the varying symbolic con-texts in which publics are constructed and their opinions are defined. Prob-lems of poll results that change with the question wording on surveys dissolvewhen we recognize that there are no standardized or neutral symbolic formatsfor presenting policy options to publics in the real world. Instead, the rhetoricselected by leaders to mobilize supporters or deflate opponents is aimed atcreating shifting opinion responses.

To cite another example, the puzzle of more informed citizens being moresusceptible to politicians' messages makes sense in a holistic context in whichbackground information about an issue is hard to separate from (and, indeed,may be synonymous with) what elites are saying about that issue in the news.Hence, informed citizens are, almost by practical necessity, defined by theirreceptivity to elite cues. In the final analysis, the question of whether publicshold legitimate or credible opinions on a given issue is hardly an academicmatter at all, but an important political question in situations in which aca-demic views become part of the political context in which opinion is con-structed. These and other shifts in perspective follow from Murray Edelman'sthinking about public opinion.

Edelman s Approacht Opinion AnalysisThe core of Murray Edelman's thinking, as developed over the corpus of workcited below, is that leaders construct publics by publicizing symbols and Ian-


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708 W Lance Bentiettguage categories that evoke emotional capacities and commonsense under-standings available to individuals, setting up a willingness to accept solutionsthat follow logically or emotionally from the symbolic framing of problems.Even when the sym bolic categories of understanding o ffered by leaders do notconvince or move people, they remove or displace other ways of th inking frompublic debate, distracting public attention from alternative courses of politicalaction. In this process of constructing publics around symbolic definitions ofsituations, some people may be aroused by images of problems and reassuredby promised solutions, whereas others are simply dumbfounded or quiescentin response to debates that offer them little symbolic grip on reality andequally little voice for their real concerns. Because the symbolic cues and thecorresponding compositions of public enemies, public citizens, and by-standers can change dramatically from situation to situation, it is not su rprisingthat measured op inion characteristics, even in studies of the same issues, oftenchange greatly over time. For Edelman, the characteristics most commonlyexpressed in opinions by way of information, intensity of emotional arousal,linkages to other issues, left-r igh t ideological statements, or stable referencesto past opinions (i.e.,all the characteristics that conventional o pin ion researchtypically tries to measure) are better understood as responses to cues embed-ded within the symbolic composition of the political situationitself.Although Edelman's cons tructionist perspective resolves some of the majorparadoxes of contemporary opinion theory, many students of opinion mayprefer to live w ith paradox rather than thin k about the ir subject matter as asymbolic cons truction. I suspect that wh at is objectionable to many academicsabout Edelman's approach is that it will not yield lawlike generalizations orgeneral theoretical p ropositions e ither about opin ion o r about its causal role indemocratic politics. Of course, traditional approaches have not yielded manyreliable generalizations or p ropositions either. However, like many of the polit i-cal actors and political problems that Edelman writes about, it may be easierfor science to live with paradox and failed solutions than abandon the popularmyths (confirmed by common sense in society) that guide scientific thoughtand practice, particularly in the social sciences in which claims to scientificstanding may be based as much on rhetoric as results.What has kept Edelman out of the mainstream of opinion research, then,isprobably not the political overtone of his work, for he displays little favoritismfor either the myth of the rational public or the myth of the unsophisticatedpublic. Rather, the trouble caused by Edelman's approach is much deeper,operating primarily at the epistemological level in which proponents of com-peting scientific paradigms and mythologies are likely to suspend their differ-ences and join ranks against him. In place of positivist assumptions about anobjective reality in which stable variables interact in measurable ways to pro-duce predictable results, Edelman sees a world of much greater ambiguity inwhich outcomes vary according to the interplay of political symbols on differ-ently situated individuals. Although the idea that opinion is inherently con-tested and ambiguous may help explain the con flicting results and conceptualambiguity in much of the academic literature, the simultaneous rejection of anobjective, predictive, positivist epistemology probably represents somethingakin to religious heresy for many scholars. Those academics may prefer tocling to the epistemological underpinnings of objective science (even at the


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Constructing Publics and Their Opinions 109sacrifice of theoretical headway) rather than adopt Edelman's social construc-tionist epistemology that incorporates the factual claims of a science of opin-ion as just so much more symbolic data to be interpreted.The people in Edelman's world have divided loyalties and they occupy dif-ferent social realities. Most individuals struggle with internal belief confl icts,making the measurement of stable beliefs and dispositions beside the point,not to mention an unl ikely resul t. In th is world, groups do not exist fu l lyfo rmed,ready to enter situations from the wings w hen cued by leaders. Rather,they are constituted and reconstituted through the symbols used by leaders todraw attention to problems, enemies, and other objects of immediate andoften fleeting social interest. In short, opinion is constructed situationallyrather than arriving predisposed on the political scene.

This does not mean that each situation begins as a blank slate or that indi-viduals experience some sort of social amnesia from one situation to the next.Leaders can cultivate stable fol lowing over time, and individuals can seek outconfi rm ing and com fort ing understandings of new si tuations. Tbe main depar-ture from conventional thinking is that Edelman assumes that political social-ization seldom involves selecting a we ll-ordere d set of values and beliefs fro mthe larger political culture. Rather, he suggests that most people learn a broadselection of values and beliefs from their cultures, contradictions and all.These values and beliefs enter into opinions in more or less organized orideologically coherent ways, depending on how they are cued by leadersacross situations. In cases in wbicb different authorities capture individual at-tention or new symbols trigger different psychological associations, individualscan draw on their large repertoires of often confl icting cultural premises tomake sense out of the shifting political situations in which they find them-selves. For most people, being stable, informed, ideological, or otherwise con-sistently opinionated is far from the paramount concern. Moreover, becausethe meaning of the moment comes to people in part from values, beliefs, andfeelings within themselves, people can claim to be true to their own under-standings about politics.

The very things that positivists regard as variables and facts, Edelman seesas symbolic elements in confl icts over tbe construction of meanings. This per-spective turns the wh ole ente rprise of science inside out. For Edelman, trad i-tional scientific claims about properties of public opinion are not hypothesesthat describe some independently existing world but are political statementsthat are actively part of the po litical const ructio n of op inio n itself. O pin ion as astanding entity, a predictable outcome, or a causal process does not exist ex-cept as a symbol that is essential ly contested by the various actors communi-cating about a particular issue at a particular time.In the f ollo w ing statements, Edelman (1977) defines his approach t o analyz-ing public opinion, emphasizing its differences with both prevail ing scienceand common sense on the subject:

Any reference to pub l ic op ini on calls to mind popular beliefs thatinfluence public officials and inhibit politicians who try to oppose it.But there are confl icting opinions whenever there is an issue, bydefin i t io n, and opinions shi ft wi th the social situation in which peo-ple find themselves, the information they get, and the level of ab-


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770 W Lance Bennettstraction at which the issue isdiscussed.There can be no one pu b-lic opin ion bu t, rather, many publics. Some opinion s change easily,while others persist indefinitely, (p. 49)

As a result of this shifting, situated nature of opinion, attempts to buildtheory by looking for stable individual predispositions or beliefs only add an-other layer of conceptual confusion without getting any closer to some reliablebasis from which future opinions can be predicted. Polls and research resultsinterpreted as expressions of underlying belief structure are better understoodas symbols rather than as fac ts about a stable pub lic that have been conve-niently if somewhat miraculously suspended in time and space:To define beliefs as public opinion itself is a way of creatingopinion In short, public op inion is a symbol whether or not itis a fact. It is often nonexistent, even respecting important ques-tions. Most of the population can have no opinion regarding thou-sands of technical, economic, professional, military, and otherdeci-sions. Pressure groups and government officials can usually citepublic opinion as a reason for taking or avoiding action w ith co nfi-dence that they will not be proven wrong. If they define the publicwill at a high enough level of generality, they cannot be wrong.(Edelman, 1977, pp. 49-50)

None of this offers much encouragement for thinking that opinion pollssomehow discover latent political dispositions among a socially coherent pub-lic. Instead, Edelman puts a constructionist spin on what teams of methodolo-gists have long regarded as serious and perhaps fatal measurement problemswith the scientific study of opinion:Op inion polls help create the opinions they count when they incor-porate evocative terms in the ir questions, as is inevitable if the ques-tions deal w ith controversial matters. (Edelman, 1977, p. 50)

By evocative terms, Edelman means that the symbols used in p oll ques-tions have similar capacities to evoke opinions as the symbols used in actualpolitical s ituations. This makes it diffic ult to imagine any scientific, much lessneutral way to write survey questions aimed at eliciting some fundam ental orbaseline opinion that exists independently of what people think in the pres-ence of more loa de d political symbols. For Edelman, thin kin g cannot bedisconnected fro m symbols, and all symbols are loaded one way or another.Further comp licating the construction of opinions throu gh polls is thatoffi-cials routinely use multireferential, emotional (condensation) symbols to dis-cuss issues during the times when polls aretaken.As Edelman suggests below,this symbolic priming of the polls reflects the artfulness of politicians whosepub lic stock in trade is the vocabulary of symbols they use to mobilize popularreactions. Increasingly in recent years, this poll-priming has become less artand more science, guided by the test-marketing of strategic symbolismthrough private political polling operations. In either case, the introduc tion ofsymbolic cues into the polling environment makes the opinion discovered


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onstructing Publicsand TheirOpinions 111by polls hard to separate from the political forces acting on it, just as it isdifficult to separate popular preferences for advertising slogans from the mar-keting research that disco vers them (Ginsberg, 1986).

This circularity or context-dependence of the opinion measured in pollsalso recommends contextual analysis over the often inconclusive efforts to sortout causal connections between poll data and policy outcomes. Instead,Edelman (1977) sees opinion and policy as inseparable constructs within thesame process:Statements about pub lic op ini on help marshall support for partic-ular policies. The term connotes a force independent of govern-ment, butalarge part of it echoes the beliefs authorities deliberatelyor unconsciously engender by appealing to fears or hopes that arealways prevalent, (p. 50)

Putting these elements of opinion together, Edelman offers a construction-ist definition ofopinion. In this de finition, b oth the mythology and the scienceof ind ependent-thinking, stable democratic publics become part of the po liti-cal contexts in which opinion is constructed: Public opinion, then, is an evocative concept through which au-thorities and pressure groups categorize beliefs in a way that mar-shalls support and opposition to their in te re st s. ... Public opinion isnot an independent entity, though the assumption that opinionsspring autonomously into people's minds legitimizes the actions ofall who can spread their ow n d efinitions of problematic events to awider pub lic. (Edelman, 1977, p. 51)

As noted earlier, accepting this definition requires overcoming epistemo-logical resistance rooted in the belief that the wo rld ou t there is constitutedby stable, rule-governed realities. In the case of pubjic opinion, this positivistepistemology relies heavily on an inte rpretive fram ework that leads to a searchfor stable individual political predispositions suitable for scaling as predictivevariables. Some studies find evidence of such stable political thinking, and themajority do not. Either way, most researchers look for evidence of such anordered reality in which individuals belong to identifiable social or ideologicalgroups that fo rm the basis ofapriori pub lics. Rejecting these notions, Edelmanencourages us to stop holding the wo rld accountable to such unlikely organiz-ing principles and to adop t, instead, a more relaxed set of interpretive assump-tions:(1) Individuals move in and out of publics from separate or m ul tip lesocial realities,1a. meaning that people with similar op inio ns about the same ob-ject may not share the same background understandings, resultingin publics and opinion formations that change constantly as thedefinition of a situation evolves, and new symbols are introduced.l b . meaning that publics do not arise on their own, but are con-


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772 W Lance Bennettstructed by leaders and other authori t ies whose rhetoric encour-ages people to imagine themselves and their experiences asl i nked .

(2) Individuals typical ly hold contradictory bel iefs that are sustained byemot iona l ly f lu id mytho log ica l th ink ing about po l i t i cs ,2a . mean ing that an individu al has the capaci ty to react di f fere ntly tos imi lar op in io n ob jects , depend ing on h ow they are symbol ized.2b. meaning that there is no standard, neutral , or objective way torepresent opinion objects, e i ther in pol ls or in the real world.(3) It fo l lows from the above proposi t ions that the objects of opinion, thecomposit ion of publ ics, and their expressed opinions cannot be dis-cussed indepe nden tly of the symbol ic constru ction of a given o pin ionsi tuat ion.Even when people express themselves in a particular way in a particularsituation (e.g., by responding to polls or refusing to respond to polls, by voting

or not voting, by r iot ing, or by declar ing their wi thdrawal from pol i t ics al to-gether) those expressions are, in t u r n , interpreted by pol i t ic ians, journal ists,and academic experts, making opinion as much the p roduc t of secondaryanal-ysis, commentary, and media spin as it is some independently existing entity.Al l of th is makes the ul t imate consti tut ion of publ ic opinion f lu id , subject tomult ip le interpretations, and something di fferent than the mere sum of ind i -vidual preferences.The advantages of considering Edelman's epistemological assumptions arenumerou s. To beginw i t h , there are the empirical gains of explaining the levelsof individual instabil i ty and the puzzling shifts in aggregate opinion that areroutinely fou nd in research. These troublesome pro ble m s of opin ion insta-bil i ty can be explained as the natural products of socialization processes inwh ich peop le learn contradictory mythologies and ways of th in king about soci-

ety, enabling individuals to express different opinions under different symboliccondi t ions.Edelman's perspective also reconciles opinion analysis with a long traditionof research in social psychology showing that opinions are flexible ways forindividuals to negotiate meanings and memberships in complex symbolic envi-ronments. For individuals defining their social roles, opinions become tenta-tive and easily adjusted symbolic bonds establishing group membership andstatus, identity, and a variety of instru me ntal goals, includ ing just ma king senseof one's own behavior and that of others (Bem, 1965; Newcomb, 1943; New-com b, Ko enig, Flackes, & W arwick, 1967). The long l ist of studies sho win g l i ttleatti tude-behavior consistency suggests that from the standpoint of individualstrying to make sense of and act meaningfully within complex society, consis-

tency is of relatively l i ttle importance compared to other coping strategies.W hen si tuational condit ions change, so do individual op inion strategies aimedat adaptation, and those changes do not appear to affect the individual's senseof internal consistency or coherence. To the contrary, stress and anxiety aremore l ikely to accompany efforts to remain atti tudinally consistent in the faceof c hang ing s ymb olic cues (Lane, 1973; Ne wc om b, 1943).Edelman's approach also offers methodological guidelines that enable us tomove beyond the seemingly irreconcilable controversies about survey ques-t ion wording and measurement problems. These rarefied methodological d is-


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onstructing Publicsand TheirOpinions 113putes can be turned outward and recon ciled as natural variations in responsesto different symbolic conditions. In place of the search for strict scientificmethods (which routinely break down under the weight of arcane interpretivedisputes), Edelman offers what might be termed analytical guidelines. Appro-priate to an interpretive methodology, these guidelines point to general pat-terns of symbolic usage, not to lawlike relations among variables or latentbodies of opinion waiting to be expressed at a drop of the right question ormeasurement scale.

Methods of Contextual Opinion AnalysisAlthough critics often charge that Edelman's approach and symbolic analysis ingeneral lack a rigorous methodology, this criticism also reflects epistemologi-cal differences of opinion about what constitutes a methodology. Workingfrom the traditions of language analysis and symbolic philosophy, Edelman'swork is rich with methodological perspectives that evolve and become moresophisticated over time. In his early works, for example, the reader will findbasic semiotic material on the interpretation of symbols within contexts andon the relation between language and thought (Edelman, 1964). Later workprovides important information about the structure of mythology, the social-ization of individuals in rich and contradictory belief environments, and theimportant recognition that po litical action is not simply a dependent variableas defined by the behavioral paradigm but becomes itself an often ambiguoussymbol that is subject to political interpretation (Edelman, 1971).Next we are invited to see the ways in which language codes establishpower relations and how the multiple realities to which people belong maykeep the inequalities of power from being recognized as problems atall.Tothecontrary, language terms fit so differently in social realities that the significanceof the same welfare, social work, or therapy situation may mean quite oppos-ing things to people on different ends of the power relationship (Edelman,1977). What is degrading or crazy-making for one actor may be understood bya vocabulary of healing, therapy, and help by another.Finally, to this broad set of guidelines fo r symbolic analysis, Edelman intro -duces the idea of complex public dramas, showing how isolated academiccategories like leadership, elections, and opinion are better understood asparts of larger dramatic spectacles in which publics are constructed symboli-cally and the ma jority of citizens look on as spectators (Edelman, 1988). Decon-structing the spectacle offers a look at the ways in which publics are written inand out of the scripts of politics and how seldom those scripts provide trans-parent understandings of power.Whether Edelman deconstructs the intimate relationship between therapistand client or the media spectacle of leaders trying to mobilize the support ofdistant followers, he keeps the analytical focus on the constitution of power insociety. Because the creation and m aintenance of power is at the core of poli-tics, the political uses of ideology and opinion on the surface are necessarilycontradictory and shifting, shoring up power relations that require continualrationalization, distraction, and d eception. If there is a consistent ideology op-erating in political life,then,it is the silent language of power, inequality, and


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774 W Lance Bennettstatus that constitutes for Edelman the dominant ideology of politics. It canonly be measured by the underlying material conditions and the often unex-pressed emotions w ith w hich peoplelive.As for the things that leaders say andthe opinions people form, these symbolic gestures change as often as theunderlying relations of power are challenged or changed.Over this progression of work, many concepts introduced early on aredeepened w ith each new analysis. For example, the idea of language categori-zation is a key to Edelman's understanding of how power is constituted andreconstituted and thus occupies an important role in his evolving analyticalmethod. Among the things he looks for in a political situation are how politicalissues, objects, or groups become categorized; what political actions flow fromthose categories; and what actions are not taken because equally plausiblecategories of understanding were not evoked in the situation:

We are seldom aware how easily and frequently our beliefs aboutcauses and consequences are created and changed by sub tle or un-conscious cues. Quite to the contrary: we ordinarily assume that welive inawo rld in which the causes and consequences of actions arestable and fairly well known. Neither the media nor academicstud-ies pay much attention to the fundamental political wo rk tha t makesthe benefits and the deprivations [imposed on people by govern-ment decisions] politically possible: the continuous creation and re-molding of the public beliefs about the causes of particular out-comes, thereby justifying some actions and building opposition toothers. ...The character, causes, and consequences of any phenomenonbecome radically different as changes are made in what is promi-nently displayed, what is repressed, and especially how observa-tions are classified. Far from being stable, the social wo rld is there-fore a chameleon, or, to suggest a be tter m etaphor, a kaleidoscopeof potential realities, any of which can be readily evoked by alteringthe ways in which observations are framed and categorized. Be-cause alternative categorizations w in support for specific beliefs andpolicies, classification schemes are central to maneuver and politica lpersuasion. (Edelman, 1992, p. 1)

In recent years, Edelman has developed the idea of category mistakes, inwhich rhetorical categories justify policies that not only fail to solve problemson their own terms but actively sustain the power relationships and inequali-ties that perpetuate and sometimes worsen the problems in question. Thus,people mistakenly continue to think in political categories that perpetuatethe very problems they seek to solve. At the same time, of course, there is nomistake about choosing language categories that p rotect the power and advan-tage of the groups who dominate public discourse.The mass media become powerful agents for publicizing these mistakes byfeaturing the words of the public officials who claim to represent the vastmajority of the people. Indeed, the most fundamental category mistake in ademocracy may be the claim of leaders to represent the views of the people,when,in fact, dw indling numbers of people participate in p olitics, endorse the


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onstructing Publicsand TheirOpinions 115views of leaders, or otherwise feel represented by the language used to de-scribe them and their life conditions.Even when political language appeals to some groups in the system, it mayprove divisive to society and democracy by making enemies of large numbersof others. As an example, Edelman refers to the fear of crime and the popularlanguage of law and order as a comm on and socially destructive category mis-take: The fashionable belief, repeatedly revitalized by the rhe toric of pub licofficials and candidates for elective office is that crime springs from evil peoplewh o thrive upon muggings, robberies, drug abuse and mu rders (Edelman,1992,p. 5). Among the policies that have flowed from this categorization wasthe dou bling of the U.S. prison population du ring the198 sw ithou t any appre-ciable effect on the underlying crime problem. At the same time, the officialembrace of and the media attention to this ca tegorization drove other, possiblymore productive ways of think ing about crime out of the marketplace of ideas.As is typical of these m istakes, however, the rhetoric of crim e played unm ista-kenly to the silent language of power and inequality in society while minimiz-ing the differences and, therefore, the electoral risks among candidates run-ning for office. As Edelman sums it up:

A category mistake playsadecisive role in converting the land of thefree into the home of the jailed. At the same time it helps officeholders win reelection and helps conservatives defeat social pro-grams. The facile evocation of inheren tly criminal types conceals thelink between an economic and social system that denies large num -bers of people the means to support themselves and their familiesand the ir resort to illegal ac tion. To break the law is in part a way ofsurviving and in part a form of social protest, usually the only effec-tive way for people who lack money and status to express theiranger at a social and political system that keeps them poor anddependent. (Edelman, 1992, p. 5)

A similar category m istake came into play surrounding the 1992 riots in LosAngeles triggered by the jury acquittal of the White police officers who beatBlack motorist Rodney King during a traffic arrest. News-making politicianswalkedatight rhetorical line by evoking sympathy and concern for the neglectof race relations and urban problems wh ile categorizing the rioting and lootingas lawless behaviors that were anything but legitimate political acts. In effect,this categorization discouraged th inking about riots as public opinion and en-couraged think ing about them as the criminal acts of individuals w ho had runout of con trol m otivated by m ob psychology. The common official denial thatthe riots were expressions of public opinion illustrates the degree to which theop inion process is largelyaprocess of defining or categorizing peop le, events,and actions.Of course, many of the riot participants interviewed in news stories werequick to categorize the riots as political acts and clear expressions of opinionwith statements like these: Discrimination against black people has been going on for a longtime. People are upse t.


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776 W Lance Bennett I don't even eat this stuff [referring to looted food in the trunkof a car]. I'm going to give it away to people who don't have anyfood.Look, I just want some of this freefood. I'm hungry. Likealot ofpeople around here, I don't have nothing. So today I do.All of this is a statement of unity. This is about the black com-mun ity coming together. (Marriott, 1992, p. A ll )

Newspaper reiaders and television viewers were presented with the alterna-tive of identifying with these statement of unknown individuals or with thestatements of officials who categorized those individuals as lawbreakers whowere anything but members of publics to be listened to on their own terms.The media offered subtle cues supporting official categorizations like thisheadline about random violence that ran over the story containing the abovequotes:FIREAND ANGUISHRAGE ASRANDOM VIOLENCESPREADSACROSSLOS ANGELES.There were , undoubted ly, many news watchers who understood the riots asexpressions of legitimate public opinion and not as opportunistic individualscom mitting random crimes on a largescale.However, many of those wh o drewtheir own political conclusions also probably understood their reading of thenews as a political activity, in itself, because of its oppositional character re-quirin g the rejection of official categories. Moreover, those who supplied theirown interpretive categories for political events risked placing themselves out-side the bounds of official, legitimate debate and authoritative interpretation.In effect, they joined company w ith the rioters whose opinions had been dis-counted and m arginalized w ithin the media context.It is easy to see why the pub lic o pin ion that is measured in polls as we ll asthe range of views typically heard in po lite society follow the categoricalpaths offered by leaders and by those respectable opponents with party orinterest group credentials. To beginwi th, being informed and being realisticabout a situation are practically synonymous with orienting one's opinions tothe o fficial categories emerging in the mass media debate. A tadeeper psycho-logical level, it is also much easier to accept those dominant categories (orsimply remain silent or quiescent) because to do otherwise places individualsin the vulnerable position of having to defend opinions against establishedviews that require no defense because they appear to be so widely accepted(Noelle-Neumann, 1984).By contrast, those who join the mainstream of opinion in a situation notonly have the strength of numbers and authorities to cite in support of theirviews, but they can evoke the slippery logic of common sense to maintain theappearance of consistency in their thinking. Indeed, it probably seemed en-tirely consistent for people to think of theLosAngeles uprising simultaneouslyas an understandable response to social injustice and , at the same time , as anunacceptable criminal activity that disqualified it as a legitimate expression ofopinion. Based on the routine coexistence of opinions like these, Edelman(1992) concludes tha t the very idea of op inion consistency is, itself, a categorymistake:

Misleading beliefs about wha t causes what are all the m ore powerfu lin politics because we typically see our opinions and those of other


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onstructing Publics and TheirOpinions 117people as consistent, firmly based in moral commitments and anunchanging ego. We do not easily recognize how volatile, easy, anddeceptive the process of constructing opinion really is.

The assumption that opinions are stable is itself a category mis-take, of course, displacing the site of opinions regarding politicalissues from the social to the individual. If opinions were indeedrooted in each individual person's character or reason, theywould consistently reflect that person's moral qualities and capacityfor logic. But opinions always involve social role taking , socialinflu-ences, and social pressures, making them both volatile and readilyrationalized as they change. Categorization is fundamental to theircreation and recreation and to their rationalization as well .(Edelman, 1992, p. 10)We come full circle here, from epistemological assumptions about the con-

struction of publics to methodological and analytical guidelines about howthose publics and their opinions are constructed. Both the composition ofpublics and the conten t of op inions are at issue empirically in aconstructionistapproach. Whether publics are perceived as collections of individuals withattitudes or as groups responding to common material conditions is an issuethatcannotbe resolvedby the academicstudy of op inion fo r a simple reason:These and other conceptions of publics are contested in the real world withimpo rtant consequences for the outcomes of public debates about social prob-lems and solutions. This perspective is difficult for those inclined toward posi-tivist epistemologies to accept and even to understand, as reflected by thisquery from one of the anonymous reviewers of this article: Maybe not re-solved, but perhaps clarified by academic study? Is there no role fo r academicstudy here? Of course there is a role for academic study but not in cla rifyingconceptions of publics that are constructed in the first place and have provedresistant to confirmation or refutation precisely because their support is moremytho logical and common sensical than emp irical. Academic study is useful inunderstanding how publics in the world are constructed symbolically, con-tested politically, and debated academically. The constructionist approach toopinion invites us to settle for no single academic definition of publics oropinion content.Tothe contrary, we should take nothing for granted about thecomposition of publics or the content of their opinions.

Instead of adopting an academic definition oif publics and opinions as endstates in some idealized political process, the poin t o f con textual analysis is tounderstand how competing categorizations of opinion are used in the processof constructing and legitimizing political actions and policies. Above all, thepoint of this sort of analysis is not to promote one category of understandingover another but to demonstrate how different political consequences flowfrom the opinion that emerges around different categories: policies that suc-ceed or fail and social relations or racial tensions that subside or p revail. In theend, we are encouraged to see how the construction of publics and theiropinions become a code for the co nstitution and recon stitution of power, gen-der, race, and the forms of inequality that affect both the quality of life and thesense of belong ing in society.


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778 VV Lance BennettEpilogue: Inventing a New Tradition for Opinion ResearchThe possibilities for understanding opinion and democracy in these ways arerich.Indeed, Edelman is not the first to point out the importance of symbolismand the social construction of political realities. His perspective connects witha broad set of intellectual traditions that include semiotics, linguistics, sociol-ogy, criticism, and political science. Among the thinkers he draws into his webare Lev Vygotsky, George Herbert Mead, Alfred Schutz, Harold Lasswell, Jac-ques Derrida, Edward Sapir, Benjamin Whorf, and Walter Lippmann, amongothers. What recommends his perspective is not just its intellectual breadthbut the way in which it addresses anomalies within the existing opinion para-digms. It is just possible that a perspective anchored in the grand empiricaltraditions of sociology, psychology, politics, and linguistics offers more fruitfulconceptual and analytical tools than the current behavioral paradigms inspiredby democratic mythology and committed by research design to the uneasyequation of polls and public opinion.In recent years there have been signs of discontent among many opinionscholars with the limits of explanatory frameworks, with the narrowness ofintrusive methods, and perhaps above all, with the anemic sense of politicscontained in much of the survey-based research tradition. A number of recentworks suggest an openness to new approaches to opinion analysis, ap-proaches that are compatible w ith Edelman's work and , more generally, wi th aconstructionist perspective. Among the best examples of what may be anemerging new tradition is Ginsberg's (1986) analysis of how polls have becomeequated with opinion politically, with the result that other forms of opinionexpression have become marginalized and individuals have become politicalcaptives of atomized imaginary publics created by the polling process itself.Along similar lines is Herbst's (1993) historical look at the evolution of polls,emphasizing the loss of a social conversation among recognizable groups andits replacement by a scientific abstraction that has little to do with a public atall. Various applications of contextual analysis showing how opinion is con-structed in different politica l situations can be found in work by Bennett (1989,1990), Entman (1989, 1992), Hershey (1989, 1992), and Sapiro (1992). Anothercollection of studies by established op inion scholars (Margolis & Mauser, 1989)approaches the possibility that opinion is as likely to be a dependent variableas an independent variable in p olicy processes and elections.All of these promising developments suggest that scholars are moving inthe direction of constructing a new tradition for opinion analysis. Perhaps themost promising development of all is that this trad ition gains a critical em piri-cal edge by placing itself at odds w ith political mythology and prevailing socialcommon sense and the academic theories that flow from them. At the sametime, a constructionist approach is open to a variety of methods and data solong as they are not driven by positivist epistemologies. Survey data, contentanalysis, and semiotics all sit comfortably together in the works cited above.The difference, of course, is that the epistemological assumptions about pub-lics, opinions, and the constitution of social situations have been changed topermit a lively discussion about what public o pinion is rather than c ontinuin gto debate what it is not.


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onstructing Publicsand TheirOpinions 119ReferencesBem,Daryl J. (1965). An expe rime ntal analysis of self persuas ion. Journal of Experimen-tal Social Psychology, 1,199-218.Bennett, W. Lance (1989). Marginalizing the majority: Condit ioning public opinion toaccept managerial democracy. In M. Margolis & G. Mauser (Eds.), Manipulatingpublic opinion (pp. 321-361). New Y ork: Dorsey Press.Benn ett, W. Lance (1990). Toward a theo ry o f press-state relations in the Un ited States.Journal of Comm unication, 40,103-125.Connolly, William E. (1987). Polit ics and ambiguity. Madison: University of WisconsinPress.Converse, Philip E. (1964). The nature of belief systems in mass publics. In D. E. Apter(Ed.), Ideology and discontent (pp . 206-261). New York: Free Press.Dalton,RussellJ.(19jB8).Citizen politics in western demo cracies.C hatham , NJ: ChathamHouse.Edelman, Murray (1964). The symbolic uses of politics. Urbana: University of I l l inoisPress.Edelman, M urra y (1971).Polit ics as symbolic action. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Edelman, Murray (1977). Polit ical language : W ords that succeed and policies that fail.San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Edelman, Murray (1988). Cons tructing the political spectac le. Chicago: University ofChicago Press.Edelman, M urra y (1992).Category mistakes and public opinion. Work in progress.Entman, Robert M. (1989). Dem ocracy without citizens. New York: Oxford UniversityPress.Entman, Robert M. (1992).Media and the transformation of enemy ima ges: The SovietUnion in 1979-1989. Paper presented at the Annu al M eeting of the Am erican Polit i-cal Science Association, Chicago.Ginsberg, Benjamin (1986).The captive pub lic. New York: Basic Books.Hal tom,William, & Ziegler, Harmon (1992). The liberal-conservative continuum. Unpub-lished manuscript.Hartz, Louis (1953). The liberal tradition in America. New York: Harcourt BraceJovanovich.Herbst, Susan (1993). Numb ered voices: How opinion polling has shaped Am ericanpolitics. Chica go: University of Chicag o Press.Hershey, Ma rjorie Randon (1989). The cam paign and the media. In G . Pomper (Ed.),Theelection of 1988. Chatham, NJ: Chatham House.Hershey, Ma rjorie Randon (1992, Septem ber). The election as spectacle: How Edelman sinterpretation does (and should) inform empirical research. Paper presented at theAnnual Meeting of the American Polit ical Science Associat ion, Chicago.Kammen, Michael (1980).People of paradox. New York: Oxford University Press.Key, V. O. , Jr. (1961).Public opinion and democracy. New York: Knopf.Lane, Robert E. (1973). Patterns of political belief. In J. Knutson (Ed.), Handbook ofpolitical psychology (pp . 95-119). San Francisco : Jossey-Bass.Margolis, Michael, & Mauser, Gary (Eds.). (1989). Manipulating public opinion. Home-wo o d , IL: Dorsey Press.Ma rrio tt, Mic he l (1992, May 1). Fire and ang uish rage as rando m viole nce spreads acrossLos Angeles. The New York Ttmes p. A l l .Neuman,W. Russell (1986).The paradox ofmasspolit ics: Knowledge and opinion In theAmerican electorate. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Newcomb, Theodore M. (1943). Personality and social change. Hinsdale, IL: DrydenPress.Newcomb, Theodore M., Koenig, Kathryn, Flacks, Richard, & Warwick, Donald (1967).


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120 W Lance BennettPersistence and change: Ben nington college an d its students after 25 years. NewYork: Wiley.Noelle-Neuman, Elisabeth (1984). The spiral of silence. Chicago: University of ChicagoPress.Rodger, Da niel T. (1987).Contested truths: Keywords in American politics since indepen-dence.New York: Basic Books.Sapiro, Virginia (1992, September). The political uses of symbolic women . Paper pre-sented at tbe Annual Meeting of the American Polit ical Science Associat ion, Chi-cago.Schuman,Howard, & Presser, Stanley (1981).Questions and answers in attitude surveys:Experiments on question form, wording, and context. San Diego, CA: AcademicPress.Zailer, John (1991,September). Political awarene ss and suscep tibility to elite influenceon foreigr) policy issues. Paper presented at the Social Science Research Councilworkshop on the Media and Foreign policy held at the tJniversity of Washington.


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