Gonzalez1

Delilah Gonzalez

Mr. Powers

English 1302

1 November 2023

Analyzing Academic Arguments for “Testing Theories of American Politics.” by Gilens & Page.

Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page use A study using a unique data set that reveals that

economic elites and organized groups have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government

policy, supporting theories of Economic-Elite Domination and Biased Pluralism, “but not

Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism” (Gilens and Page 564). The article

then explains what the article is going to cover; for example, the research explores

representation, public opinion, and mass media concerning inequality and public policy and the

discussion of electoral democracy, economic-elite domination, majoritarian and biased pluralism,

and the independent influence of four actors on U.S. policy making.

The article then mentions the “Four Theoretical Traditions” (Gilens and Page 565), which

explains to us that The four theoretical traditions (which are the four paragraphs) produce a vast

literature, with some scholars working independently or across categories. Ideal types of theory

outline distinctive predictions on societal sources of influence to support their claim. The article

then explains what the four theoretical traditions type of theoretical tradition are, which named

each of the four paragraphs called “Majoritarian Electoral Democracy” (Gilens and Page 565),

“Economic-Elite Domination” (Gilens and Page 566), “Majoritarian Pluralism” (Gilens and Page

566), and “Biased Pluralism” (Gilens and Page 567).

The article then next has a paragraph called “Testing Theoretical Predictions” (Gilens and

Page 568), which gives a definition of Gilens and discusses what the section is going to be about,
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which is about the Gilens unique data set that allows for an empirical effort to estimate the

influence of affluent, poor, and middle-income citizens on public policy. The article then gives

evidence to showcase Table 1, “Theoretical predictions concerning the independent influence of

sets of actors upon policy outcomes” (Gilens and Page 570). Not only does the article give Table

1 as one of their evidence, but also Table 2, “Correlations among independent variables” (Gilens

and Page 571), Table 3, “Policy outcomes and the policy preferences of average citizens,

economic, elites, and interest groups” (Gilens and Page 571), and Table 4, “The separate policy

impact of business-oriented and mass-based interest groups” (Gilens and Page 575). Not only

does the article give four tables in total throughout, but it also gives us a figure called Figure 1

“Predicted probability of policy adoption (dark lines, left axes) by policy disposition; the

distribution of preferences (gray columns, right axes)” (Gilens and Page 573). The article then

added a conclusion after the studies about each of the four theoretical traditions, “Notes” (Gilens

and Page 577), “Supplementary Materials” (Gilens and Page 580), and then “References”

(Gilens and Page 580).

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Work Cited

Gilens, Martin; Page, Benjamin I. “Testing theories of American politics: Elites, interest groups,

and average citizens.” Perspectives on Politics. 2014, Vol. 12, No. 3. pp. 564-581.