Political Science Commons^™

Participation And Representation: Does Risk Acceptance Influence The Decision Making Of Political Actors?, Joshua Daniel Hostetter

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Are political actors influenced by their acceptance of risk? By political actors I mean individuals in society or government that have an influence on political outcomes. By risk acceptance I mean the degree to which an individual is comfortable with uncertainty and willing to challenge the status quo. The purpose of the present dissertation is to further enhance scholarly understanding of the causal psychological mechanisms that influence political behavior by considering individual risk acceptance.

Kam’s (2012) theoretical framework suggests that risk-accepting individuals are more likely to participate in politics because they seek out exciting and novel activities. She does …

Testing Democracy: The Case Of The 17th Amendment And Constituency Representation, Rhonda Wrzenski

LSU Master's Theses

This paper examines a unique aspect of Congressional history centering on the passage of the 17th amendment in 1913, which shifted the power of U.S. Senate elections from the state legislature to state electorates. This paper examines how the passage of the amendment affected the relationship between characteristics of the state electorate and the roll call behavior of U.S. Senators. Due to the historical nature of the time period, I use Presidential election results by state, party control of the governorship and upper and lower chambers of the state legislature, as well as a number of demographic variables, to estimate …