Civic Engagement and MassElite Policy Agenda Agreement in American Communities
By: HILL, Kim Quaile
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Contributor(s): MATSUBAYASHI, Tetsuya.
Material type: 
ArticlePublisher: New York, NY : American Political Science Association, May 2005American Political Science Review 99, 2, p. 215-224 Abstract: We test propositions about how different forms of civic engagement are related to democratic representation in American communities. Our data are for the samples of communities, their citizens, and their leaders originally examined by Verba and Nie in Participation in America (1972). Our analyses of those data indicate that membership in bridging socialcapital civic associations is unrelated to democratic responsiveness of leaders to the mass public but that bonding socialcapital membership is negatively associated with such responsiveness. We also demonstrate that bonding socialcapital civic engagement weakens the democratic linkage processes inherent in elections.
We test propositions about how different forms of civic engagement are related to democratic representation in American communities. Our data are for the samples of communities, their citizens, and their leaders originally examined by Verba and Nie in Participation in America (1972). Our analyses of those data indicate that membership in bridging socialcapital civic associations is unrelated to democratic responsiveness of leaders to the mass public but that bonding socialcapital membership is negatively associated with such responsiveness. We also demonstrate that bonding socialcapital civic engagement weakens the democratic linkage processes inherent in elections.
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