Social Networks

PS 519: Dr. Jeff Mondak

Fall 2013

==Individuals, Aggregates, and the Social Logic of Politics == This week, our task is to develop a foundation for the study of social interdependence and political behavior. First, we will consider the general matters of interdependence and embeddedness. Second, we will review some overviews regarding the potential political significance of contexts and networks. Lastly, we will assess a critique of contexts and contextual analysis.
 * 1) Schelling, Thomas C. 1978. Micromotives and Macrobehavior. New York: Norton. Chs. 1-2.
 * 2) Milgram, Stanley. 1967 . “The small-world problem.” Psychology Today 1: 61-7.
 * 3) Granovetter, Mark. 1985. “Economic Action and Social Structure: The Problem of Embeddedness.” American Journal of Sociology 91: 481-510.
 * 4) Sprague, John. 1982. “Is there a Micro-Theory Consistent with Contextual Analysis?” In Elinor Ostrom, ed., Strategies of Political Inquiry. Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage.
 * 5) Zuckerman, Alan S. 2005. “Returning to the Social Logic of Politics.” In Alan S. Zuckerman, ed., The Social Logic of Politics Personal Networks as Contexts for Political Behavior. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
 * 6) Huckfeldt, Robert, and John Sprague. 1995. Citizens, Politics and Social Communication: Information and Influence in an Election Campaign. New York: Cambridge University Press. Chs. 1-2.
 * 7) Sinclair, Betsy. 2012. The Social Citizen. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Ch. 1.
 * 8) Hauser, Robert M. 1974. “Contextual Analysis Revisited.” Sociological Methods &amp; Research 2: 365-75.

==Politics and Context ==
 * 1) Political Attitudes and the Local Community Putnam, Robert D. 1966. “Political Attitudes and the Local Community.” American Political Science Review 60: 640-54.
 * 2) Wright, Gerald C., Jr. 1977. “Contextual Models of Electoral Behavior: The Southern Wallace Vote.” American Political Science Review 71: 497-50 8.
 * 3) Huckfeldt, Robert. 1979. “Political Participation and the Neighborhood Social Context.” American Journal of Political Science 23: 579-92.
 * 4) MacKuen, Michael and Courtney Brown. 1987. “Political Context and Attitude Change.” American Political Science Review 81: 471-90.
 * 5) Wald, Kenneth D., Dennis E. Owen and Samuel S. Hill, Jr. 1988. “Churches as Political Communities.” American Political Science Review 82: 531-48.
 * 6) Grober, Jens, and Arthur Schram. 2006. “Neighborhood Information Exchange and Voter Participation: An Experimental Study.” American Political Science Review 100: 235-48.
 * 7) Cho, Wendy K. Tam, James G. Gimpel and Joshua J. Dyck. 2006. “Residential Concentration, Political Socialization, and Voter Turnout.” Journal of Politics 68: 156-67.

Cross-National Research on the Social Logic of Politics
This week’s readings continue our focus on contexts, but attention shifts to research conducted outside of the United States.
 * 1) Przeworkski, Adam, and Glaucio A.D. Soares. 1971. “Theories in Search of a Curve: A Contextual Interpretation of Left Vote.” American Political Science Review 65: 51-65.
 * 2) Langton, Kenneth P., and Ronald Rapoport. 1975. “Social Structure, Social Context and Partisan Mobilization: Urban Workers in Chile.” Comparative Political Studies 8: 318-44.
 * 3) Ames, Barry. 1994. “The Reverse Coattails Effect: Local Party Organization in the 1989 Brazilian Presidential Election.” American Political Science Review 88: 95-111.
 * 4) Canache, Damarys. 1994. “Looking Out My Back Door: The Neighborhood Context and Perceptions of Relative Deprivation.” Political Research Quarterly 47: 547-71.
 * 5) Hiskey, Jonathan T., and Damarys Canache. 2005. “The Demise of One-Party Politics in Mexican Municipal Elections.” British Journal of Political Science 35: 257-84.

Group Consciousness and Perceptions of Others
Groups potentially matter for people’s judgments about politics because groups may serve as sources of information, as points of reference, and as entities to which individuals form attachments and develop concerns. Expansive literatures examine the group bases of political judgment. This week, we take a brief glimpse at a few select aspects of this research.


 * 1) Conover, Pamela Johnston. 1984. “The Role of Social Groups in Political Thinking.” British Journal of Political Science 18: 51-76.
 * 2) Miller, Arthur H., Patricia Gurin, Gerald Gurin and Oksana Malanchuk. 1981. “Group Consciousness and Political Participation.” American Journal of Political Science 25: 494-511.
 * 3) Mutz, Diana C. 1998. Impersonal Influence: How Perceptions of Mass Collectives Affect Political Attitudes. New York: Cambridge University Press. Ch. 1.
 * 4) Weatheford, Stephen M. 1983. “Evaluating Economic Policy: A Contextual Model of the Opinion Formation Process.” Journal of Politics 45: 866-88.
 * 5) Mutz, Diana C., and Jeffery J. Mondak. 1997. “Dimensions of Sociotropic Behavior: Group-Based Judgments of Fairness and Well-Being.” American Journal of Political Science 41: 284-308.
 * 6) Nelson, Thomas E., and Donald R. Kinder. 1996. “Issue Frames and Group-Centrism in American Public Opinion.” Journal of Politics 58: 1055-78.
 * 7) Reeves, Andrew, and James G. Gimpel. 2012. “Ecologies of Unease: Geographic Context and National Economic Evaluations.” Political Behavior 34: 507-34.

The Columbia Studies
The Columbia research program provided a critical early step toward consideration of the significance of the social flow of information. We read excerpts from one of the Columbia team’s books, and we also discuss some later assessments of this research program and its legacy.


 * 1) Katz, Elihu, and Paul F. Lazarsfeld. 1955. Personal Influence: The Part Played by People in the Flow of Mass Communications. Glencoe, Il: Free Press. Pp. 15-42, 137-48, 187-97, 321-34.
 * 2) Eulau, Heinz. 1980. “The Columbia Studies of Personal Influence: Social Network Analysis.” Social Science History 4: 207-28.
 * 3) Summers, John H. 2006. “Perpetual Revelations: C. Wright Mills and Paul Lazarsfeld.” The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 608: 25-40.

Ties
As a preface to examination of political discussion networks, we read a few studies, including some classics, mostly from outside of political science, on the nature and importance of ties in social networks, theories on the nature of social influence, and some baseline information about the characteristics of discussion networks.




 * 1) Granovetter, Mark. 1973. “The Strength of Weak Ties.” American Journal of Sociology 78: 1360-80.
 * 2) Burt, Ronald S. 1987. “Social Contagion and Innovation” Cohesion versus Structural Equivalence.” American Journal of Sociology 92: 1287-35.
 * 3) Latane, Bibb. 1996. “Dynamic Social Impact: The Creation of Culture by Communication.” Journal of Communication 46: 13-25.
 * 4) Carpenter, D., K. Esterling, and D. Lazer. 2003. “The Strength of Strong Ties: A Model of Contact-Making in Policy Networks with Evidence from U.S. Health Politics." Rationality and Society 15: 411-40.
 * 5) McPherson, Miller, Lynn Smith-Lovin and Matthew E. Brashears. 2006. “Social Isolation in America: Changes in Core Discussion Networks Over Two Decades.” American Sociological Review 71: 353-75.