Voting Affect The Level Of Support Constituents Award Their Representative Essay

When looking how effectively a country represents its citizens, it is important to take into account the manner in which they are represented. The two main types of representation are descriptive and agency representation. Descriptive representation is the concept that those who represent the American people should not only have the same political interest, but should also mirror the demographic makeup of the people. Agency representation, which is what the United States congress looks like, is when the representation does not reflect the demographic, but they speak for their constituents’ interests in congress. The constituents are able to hold the representatives accountable and can choose not to elect them in the next term, so the representatives

The United States Congress is more than likely the most significant representative institution in the United States government. Each member of Congress has a primary obligation to the district, to his or her constituency. Though Congress is divided into two parts, called the House of Representatives and the Senate, they both play different roles in the legislature process. Senate is more deliberative and the House is the more centralized and organized. Congress is supposed to represent the American people but they will not always make the “right” decisions, according to some individuals. Obviously it is impossible to please everybody, but surely the laws that are being passed are because Congress views some sort of usefulness from it. There are two different types of representation that was spoken about in the chapter including sociological and agency representation. Sociological is based off of the idea that if two individuals have similar background, character, interests, and perspectives, then they can correctly represent others’ views. Agency is when a representative is held accountable to a constituency for when that constituency is represented poorly. The constituents have the power to hire and fire their representatives.

The main argument in The Challenge of Congressional Representation is whether or not Congress is truly represented. Richard Fenno chose five members of Congress to follow and he reports their thoughts on Congressional representation throughout this book. The five members Fenno followed all seem to want to help their constituents; however, they have completely different means of obtaining constituent approval. The problem of representation within Congress is mainly brought up by constituents. The issue of representation; however, also concerns the representative.

Indeed, James Madison observed in The Federalist No. 10 that the true test of a representative is his or her ability to make difficult decisions that promote the long-term best interests of the people back home. “A representative government”, he wrote, “ought to refine and enlarge the public views by passing them through the medium of a chosen body of citizens whose wisdom may best discern the

Another way members of Congress represent their constituents is by taking the role of the

Essentially, the author found statistically significant and substantial evidence that supported all three of his hypotheses. For the first hypothesis, in the Farm subsidy study, participants viewed legislators whom sided with their district 3.69 units more favorable than those whom did not, while in the Nuclear Energy study, the comparable effect was 1.69 units (246). On the second hypothesis highlighted in the nuclear study, the support for the legislators were 0.83 when they were presented as from the participants own state, while the

Democracy is conceptualized as a “will of the people, by the people, and for the people.” Intrinsically, all variants of democratic representation must take into consideration the will of the majority of the electorate. In the democratic approach, the representative carries the will of their district to Congress and ensures it is sufficiently expressed. Further, a delegate representative is better placed to be in constant communication with the grassroots and understand their district issues which would also help with the articulation of such matters in the House. Implicitly, delegate representatives also have better chances of re-election as they will often refrain from being in contravention of their district’s

As the election approaches, it’s significant to understand the responsibilities of state senators. A conscientious senator can bring numerous remarkable prospects for the state and people. Otherwise, people will suffer from various inconveniences. In the United States, state senators are officials who represent their own districts within the states. In most states, state senators are required to serve in the house of the state government’s legislature and one role in common is state senators must represent their districts’ residents. For representing the constituents, the state senators need to listen and read the emails and letters which express the constituents’ opinions. Next, the state senators should attend to constituents. They can talk to constituents, give public speeches and provide official updates. Although state senators are not required to propose legislation, they treat it as their responsibilities in order to benefit the constituents. Considering with the basic benefits and future of the state and people, I

In my opinion, I feel that constituents have power over congress members because they have the power to vote them in or out of office. On the other hand, I feel that voting constituents have the least amount of influence over congress members, who strive for money contributions in order to, run their political campaigns, compared to donors and PACs.

The article Rethinking Representation, written by Jane Mansbridge, explains how there are three different forms of representation apart from the traditional idea of “promissory” representation. Promissory representation is the traditional model of representation. It focuses on the idea that during a representative’s campaign they make promises to their constituents. During the representative’s time in office, these promises are either kept or not fulfilled. As Mansbridge notes, within the last 20 years there has been three new forms of representation, they are anticipatory, gyroscopic, and surrogate representation.

Many political science researchers study the forces that drive the vote. One of the earliest, and most well known, books about election studies is The American Voter. Written in 1960, the book tries to explain a model that describes what drives Americans to vote the way they do. The model suggests that social factors determine ones party identification, which determines one's issue positions and evaluation of candidate's characteristics. These forces all work together to determine how one will vote. This model may or may not still hold true today, as political researchers are not in agreement as to what exactly drives the vote. One thing that does remain true, however, is that factors such as social groups, party identification, issues,

The consequences of federal pork barreling are today's public opinions of Congress. Voters express a sixty percent approval rating of their own personal representatives. However, voters opinion of Congress as a

The phrase “Make your voice heard and vote!” is always being tossed around. What they people don 't know is that your voice isn 't always heard. Your presidential vote doesn 't really matter because of the electoral college. They make the choice of what your state wants. What you want! People are being silenced for whom they want to become president and believe they are living in a county with a democratic government. And with the removal of the electoral college, we can be heard.

Less than 50% of eligible voters will turn out to vote at national elections, and at the local elections there are less than 25%. There is a correlation between voting behavior and the demographic of those voting.

It is not merely that different voting systems count votes differently, but that different voting-system arrangements alter the incentives that voters and parties face to do certain things: to vote for one party over another, to try to appeal to one group of voters over another, and so on (Pilon 12)6.