Daniel Hopkins
political scientist
Georgetown University
Political Behavior and Local Politics
When Mayors Matter: Estimating the Impacy of Mayoral Partisanship on City Policy
American Journal of Political Science, 2011, 55(2):326-339, co-authored with Elisabeth Gerber
Do Democratic mayors spend city money differently? This paper uses regression discontinuity and a novel data set of big-city elections to show that they do--but only on areas under their direct control, such as policing and fire. [Supplemental Information] [Data]
After It's Too Late: Estimating the Policy Impacts of Black Mayoralties in U.S. Cities
Forthcoming, American Politics Research, SSRN Working Paper 1632390, co-authored with Katherine T. McCabe
Mayoral elections between black and white candidates frequently generate charged rhetoric. But do black mayoralties pursue different fiscal or employment policies once elected? This paper shows that the answer is typically no, with the exception of police hiring and spending.
Journal of Politics, 2009, 71(3):769-781
Analysts have commonly discussed the "Wilder effect," the gap between how black candidates poll and how they perform on election day. Testing these claims on all elections for Senator or Governor from 1989 to 2006, this paper finds that the Wilder effect disappeared for black candidates by the mid-1990s. And female candidates never suffered from a polling-performance gap. [Data]
Whose Economy? Perceptions of Economic Performance During Unequal Growth
Public Opinion Quarterly, 2012, 76(1):50-70. SSRN Working Paper 1736742
Americans' perceptions of economic performance are a powerful influence on Presidential approval and candidate choice, but past research rarely considers what influences these perceptions. It also has not considered how rising income inequality has shaped economic perceptions. In past work, snapshots from elections create the impression that these assessments of economic performance are influenced only by income growth among the wealthy. Examining more than 215,000 respondents over three decades, however, we learn that income growth among the poor is frequently more influential.
The Reinforcing Effects of Fox News
Under Review; co-authored with Jonathan M. Ladd
Can the introduction of a new media outlet with a distinctive ideological perspective shape election outcomes? This paper uses individual-level data from the 2000 National Annenberg Election Study to show that the effects of Fox News access varied by party.
Partisan Reinforcement and the Poor: The Impact of Context on Attitudes toward Poverty
Social Science Quarterly, 2009, 90(3):744-764
Can contextual factors shape attitudes toward the poor? Synthesizing racial and political theories of contextual effects, this paper explores attitudes about who is to blame for poverty. It demonstrates that both an area's racial composition and its partisan composition can influence respondents' views about why people are poor. [Code]
Racial Contexts' Enduring Influence on Attitudes toward Poverty
Social Science Quarterly, 2009, 90(3):770-776
A reply, this article extends the original evidence that racial contexts--and not certain other contextual measures--shape attitudes toward poverty. It then presents new evidence from an exogenous demographic shock to reinforce the claim that racial contexts shape views of the poor.
Inactive by Design: Neighborhood Design and Political Participation
Political Behavior, 2012, 34(1):79-101, co-authored with Thad Williamson
Suburban communities in the U.S. have sometimes been condemned for their lack of civic engagement. This article takes a critical look at such claims. It uses multilevel modeling and data on nearly 30,000 Americans to demonstrate that certain aspects of suburban design do dampen political participation--but that other aspects of suburban design have cross-cutting effects.
Discounting Politics: The Impact of Large Retailers on American Communities
Wal-Mart and other large retailers have been heavily criticized for their impact on American communities, but social scientists have been slow to explore just how real those impacts are. This working paper uses matching and hierarchical modeling approaches to estimate how large retailers reshape the civic life of the communities they enter.