Altruism and self-interest in democracies : individual participation in government

Resource Information

The work Altruism and self-interest in democracies : individual participation in government represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in University of Missouri Libraries. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

Altruism and self-interest in democracies : individual participation in government

Title remainder

individual participation in government

Statement of responsibility

Richard Jankowski

Creator

• Jankowski, Richard, 1946-

Author

• Jankowski, Richard, 1946-

Subject

• PHILOSOPHY / Political
• POLITICAL SCIENCE / Civics & Citizenship
• Altruism -- Political aspects
• Political participation -- Philosophy
• Voting research
• POLITICAL SCIENCE / History & Theory
• Democracy

Language

eng

Summary

"Individuals have little incentive to vote, acquire political information or contribute campaign funds, because their vote has very little chance of affecting the outcome of an election. Jankowski offers an explanation and evidence for political participation based on the fact that most individuals are weakly altruistic. Other proposed explanations of political participation (civic duty and expressive behavior) are not supported by the evidence, or fail to explain the many different forms of political participation, such as the acquisition of political information. Evidence is presented that liberals and conservatives are equally altruistic. Therefore, an explanation of why liberals and conservatives differ in their support of various government programs to help the needy is presented. Jankowski's analysis examines both the electoral and post-electoral phases of representative democracy. In the post-election phase, interest groups and elected representatives dominate the policy process. It is shown that altruistic individuals exert their influence primarily through public interest groups"--

Assigning source

Provided by publisher

Cataloging source

DLC

Dewey number

323/.042

Index

index present

LC call number

JF799

LC item number

.J36 2015

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

bibliography