IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jocore/v46y2002i5p693-711.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Legislators' Personality Traits and Congressional Support for Free Trade

Author

Listed:
  • SCOTT CRICHLOW

    (Department of Political Science West Virginia University)

Abstract

The determinants of congressional voting behavior on trade matters from 1991 to 1996 are investigated. Three personal characteristics of members of Congress—level of distrust toward others, perception of their control over their environment, and level of cognitive complexity—are examined for effect on voting patterns on proposals to lower barriers to international trade. These personality factors are included in a comprehensive model of congressional voting behavior. Results show that these variables had significant effects on specific trade votes, controlling for the impact of members' party, ideology, support for the presidency, and the nature of their district's workforce. These findings show that the personality attributes of legislators may have an important influence on their voting behavior, particularly on matters involving international cooperation.

Suggested Citation

  • Scott Crichlow, 2002. "Legislators' Personality Traits and Congressional Support for Free Trade," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 46(5), pages 693-711, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jocore:v:46:y:2002:i:5:p:693-711
    DOI: 10.1177/002200202236170
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/002200202236170
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/002200202236170?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. McArthur, John & Marks, Stephen V, 1988. "Constitutent Interest vs. Legislator Ideology: The Role of Political Opportunity Cost," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 26(3), pages 461-470, July.
    2. Kalt, Joseph P & Zupan, Mark A, 1984. "Capture and Ideology in the Economic Theory of Politics," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(3), pages 279-300, June.
    3. Nollen, Stanley D & Iglarsh, Harvey J, 1990. "Explanations of Protectionism in International Trade Votes," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 66(2), pages 137-153, August.
    4. Peltzman, Sam, 1984. "Constituent Interest and Congressional Voting," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 27(1), pages 181-210, April.
    5. Bartels, Larry M., 1991. "Constituency Opinion and Congressional Policy Making: The Reagan Defense Buildup," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 85(2), pages 457-474, June.
    6. Miller, Warren E. & Stokes, Donald E., 1963. "Constituency Influence in Congress," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 57(1), pages 45-56, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nipoli Kamdar & Jorge Gonzalez, 1998. "An empirical analysis of the U.S. Senate vote on NAFTA and GATT," International Advances in Economic Research, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 4(2), pages 105-114, May.
    2. Dennis, Christopher & Medoff, Marshall H. & Magnera, Michael, 2008. "Constituents' economic interests and senator support for spending limitations," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 37(6), pages 2443-2453, December.
    3. Potters, Jan & Sloof, Randolph, 1996. "Interest groups: A survey of empirical models that try to assess their influence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 403-442, November.
    4. Elisabeth R. Gerber & Jeffrey B. Lewis, 2004. "Beyond the Median: Voter Preferences, District Heterogeneity, and Political Representation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(6), pages 1364-1383, December.
    5. Dennis, Christopher & Bishin, Benjamin & Nicolaou, Politimy, 2000. "Constituent diversity and congress: the case of NAFTA," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 349-360, July.
    6. Lowell Johnson, 1997. "The Lighthouse Reform Movement in Antebellum America," Departmental Working Papers 199703, Rutgers University, Department of Economics.
    7. Rausser, Gordon C. & de Gorter, Harry, 1988. "Endogenizing Policy In Models Of Agricultural Markets," 1988 Annual Meeting, August 1-3, Knoxville, Tennessee 270460, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    8. John Lott, 1987. "Political cheating," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 52(2), pages 169-186, January.
    9. Bohara, Alok K. & Camargo, Alejandro Islas & Grijalva, Therese & Gawande, Kishore, 2005. "Fundamental dimensions of U.S. trade policy," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 93-125, January.
    10. Christopher John Boudreaux, 2015. "Democratic age and the size of governmen," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 35(3), pages 1531-1542.
    11. Gertrud Fremling & John Lott, 1988. "Televising legislatures: Some thoughts on whether politicians are search goods," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 58(1), pages 73-78, July.
    12. Stadelmann, David & Portmann, Marco & Eichenberger, Reiner, 2013. "Quantifying parliamentary representation of constituents’ preferences with quasi-experimental data," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 170-180.
    13. Stuart D. Allen & Amelia S. Hopkins, 1997. "The Textile, Apparel, and Footwear Act of 1990: Determinants of Congressional Voting," Public Finance Review, , vol. 25(5), pages 542-552, September.
    14. Robert Lowry, 1998. "Religion and the demand for membership in environmental citizen groups," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 94(3), pages 223-240, March.
    15. Sean Gailmard & Jeffery A. Jenkins, 2009. "Agency Problems, the 17th Amendment, and Representation in the Senate," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 53(2), pages 324-342, April.
    16. Matilde Bombardini & Bingjing Li & Francesco Trebbi, 2023. "Did US Politicians Expect the China Shock?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 113(1), pages 174-209, January.
    17. Michael Davis & Philip Porter, 1989. "A test for pure or apparent ideology in congressional voting," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 60(2), pages 101-111, February.
    18. Li, Wei & Qiang, Christine Zhen-Wei & Xu, Lixin Colin, 2005. "Regulatory Reforms in the Telecommunications Sector in Developing Countries: The Role of Democracy and Private Interests," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(8), pages 1307-1324, August.
    19. Andranik Tangian, 2017. "Policy Representation of a Parliament: The Case of the German Bundestag 2013 Elections," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 151-179, January.
    20. Glenn Parker & Suzanne Parker, 2009. "Earning through learning in legislatures," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 141(3), pages 319-333, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:jocore:v:46:y:2002:i:5:p:693-711. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://pss.la.psu.edu/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.