A romantic notion of democracy depicts democratic governments as being accountable to their citizens and acting in their citizens’ best interests. Academic models of democratic government depict citizens and voters as having public policy preferences, and candidates and parties adjust their platforms to conform to these preferences.
My new book, Following Their Leaders, explains that the direction of causation goes (mostly) in the other direction. Citizens and voters view their political identities as anchored on a party, a candidate, or an ideology and then adopt the public policy preferences of their anchors.
Citizens get their public policy preferences from the political elite
