Political knowledge and the use of candidate race as a voting cue

Tetsuya Matsubayashi, Michiko Ueda

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

17 Scopus citations

Abstract

Do White voters use candidate race as a voting cue in biracial electoral contests? We argue that the answer to this question depends on the level of political knowledge and information that voters have rather than on their attitudes toward minorities. Our analyses of precinct- and individual-level data show that White voters who are likely to be informed about candidates vote less often for the Democratic party when the candidate is Black, whereas vote choices of White voters who are unlikely to be informed about candidates are unaffected by candidate race.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)380-413
Number of pages34
JournalAmerican Politics Research
Volume39
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 2011

Keywords

  • White backlash
  • biracial elections
  • political information
  • political knowledge
  • race
  • racial threat
  • voting

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Sociology and Political Science

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