Not Another Politics Podcast

When it comes to cable news, Fox and CNN have pretty partisan viewers. So, what would happen if Fox viewers tuned into CNN for a month? Would they suddenly adopt different views more aligned with CNN? UC Berkeley political scientist David Broockman and his colleagues wanted to find out. When they paid Fox News viewers to watch CNN, they found that Fox News viewers became more supportive of vote-by-mail, and less likely to believe that then-Democratic candidate Joe Biden wanted to eliminate all police funding. The findings have made huge waves in the media, so we decided to take our unique microscope to the paper to see if we can get a fuller picture of what these findings tell us. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

By now, we've heard a lot about how state-owned Russian television is distorting the truth about the war in Ukraine. But Russian TV doesn't just reach Russian viewers. Some Ukrainians can receive its analog television signals.To understand how this propaganda influences Ukrainians, we turned to New York University political scientist Arturas Rozenas, to talk about his 2017 paper, "Electoral Effects of Biased Media: Russian Television in Ukraine". Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We know that lobbyists have the power to influence politics. But not all lobbyists are working on behalf of corporate interest groups. Sometimes, city officials actually hire lobbyists to represent the interests of their constituents in the state legislature. Why would cities do this? This is what New York University political science professor Julia Payson explores in her paper, "The Partisan Logic of City Mobilization: Evidence From State Lobbying Disclosures." She finds that local governments are more likely to depend on lobbyists when there are partisan and ideological mismatches with their state legislators. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Paper link: https://dthompson.scholar.ss.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2021/12/Ferrer_et_al_Election_Admin.pdf  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Russia has invaded Ukraine. This horrible global crisis raises questions about Putin’s ultimate ambitions, and how nations can make credible deterrent threats in incredible circumstances. We’re not experts on the Ukraine conflict, but we can dive into the political science research to get some clarity on the underlying dynamics that may be at play. And there’s no better paper to turn to than “Fear, Appeasement, and the Effectiveness of Deterrence” from Alexander V. Hirsch at Caltech. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You've probably heard this one before: college football games and shark attacks influence elections in favor of incumbents. Surprising findings like these are exciting, and seem to tell us a lot about the stability of our democracy and the rationality of voters. If you listen to our podcasts regularly, you’ve probably also heard this one: Anthony Fowler doesn’t think voters are irrational. On this episode, we cover a back and forth of academic papers our co-host had arguing that the original result about college football games was a false-positive, and what lessons we should draw from this exchange. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Link to paper: https://www.princeton.edu/~rbenabou/papers/beliefs%20qje%201%20web.pdf Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Paper: http://davidyyang.com/pdfs/famine_draft.pdf Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Paper link: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/lsq.12206 Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We often think of polarization as a single policy spectrum with Democrats to the left and Republicans to the right. But what if this entire framework is wrong, and this error itself is worsening the divides in our country? This is what Michigan State University political scientist Matt Grossman argues in his article: “Ideological Republicans and Group Interest Democrats: The Asymmetry of American Party Politics”. He says that what really divides us isn’t differing policy views but different views of the purpose of government itself. And, perhaps offers us a way out of our current polarization spiral. Grossman is also the host of another fantastic podcast "The Science of Politics", which we highly recommend you give a listen! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.