The Effects of Blaming Others for Legislative Inaction on Individual and Collective Evaluations

• Published date: 01 February 2020
• Author: David Doherty,Laurel Harbridge‐Yong
• Date: 01 February 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/lsq.12252

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LEGISLATIVE STUDIES QUARTERLY, 45, 1, February 2020

DOI: 10.1111/lsq.12252

DAV ID DOH ER TY

Loyola University Chicago

LAUREL HARBRIDGE-YONG

Northwestern University

The Effects of Blaming Others for

Legislative Inaction on Individual and

Collective Evaluations

Legislators commonly blame others for gridlock. We posit that legislators

may engage in this type of rhetoric to minimize the individual reputational risks

associated with legislative inaction or to boost the relative standing of their party.

In a series of six survey experiments, we find that blaming others for inaction

undermines voters’ evaluations of individual legislators who engage in this rhe-

torical strategy. This effect is particularly pronounced among out-partisans and

independents. However, blaming rhetoric can also enhance the standing of the

blamer’s party relative to the opposing party across all groups (including out-

partisans), in large part by undermining the reputations of these other actors.

Ultimately, we show that when an individual legislator engages in blaming rheto-

ric, the immediate net electoral effects are null. This suggests that coordinated

efforts by a party to blame opponents may improve the party’s relative standing,

while imposing few costs on those engaged in blaming.

Members of Congress ca re about their own electoral interests

(Mayhew 1974) but may also care about collective reput ations,

particula rly those of their parties (Cox and McCubbins 2005).

Ideally, a member may seek to boost hi s or herown r eputation

and that of the member’s party by claim ing credit for passi ng

popular legislation (Lipi nski 2004; Weaver 2018). However, when

gridlock ma kes it diffi cult for legislators to accu mulate positive

accomplish ments, they may blame others and c ast themselves as

good-faith actors contending w ith unfortunate circumsta nces.

This rhetorica l strategy may affect how voters evaluate the legis-

lator engaged in blami ng, but also how they evaluate the legisla-

tor’s party relative to the target of blame. We report f indings from

six survey expe riments that illustrate how legislators’ col lective

© 2019 Washington University in St. L ouis

70 David Doherty and Laurel Harbridge-Yong

interests may lead the m to pursue rhetorical strategies th at un-

dermine t heir individu al reputations.

Our evidence s uggests that members have little to gain as

individuals by blam ing others for inaction. Th is rhetoric fails to

enhance the ir personal reputation among copartisa ns and leads

opposing partis ans and, in some cases, indep endents, to evalu-

ate them less favorably than legislators who simply acknowledge

legislative failures. However, we also find th at blaming the oppos-

ing party improves the rel ative standing of the legislators’ party.

These gain s appear to be primarily t ied to degradation of evalu-

ations of the opposing part y, rather than improvements in how

the legislator’s party is evaluate d. Taken together, our evidence

speaks to cr itical questions about how legislators m ay balance

tensions betwee n their individual electoral i nterests and their col-

lective partisan interests (e.g., Cox and McCubbins 2005; Koger

and Lebo 2017; Rohde 1991). Our evidence suggests that, in the

aggregate, the strategy of blaming the opp osing party may be ef-

fective: the joint blaming efforts of members of one party m ay

substantially deg rade the opposing par ty’s reputation, while only

modestly damag ing the personal reputation of each legislator.

Individual and Colle ctive Consequences of Blami ng Rhetoric

Existing work finds t hat factors like party polarization, di-

vided government, and a lack of a filibust er-proof majority in the

Senate—all common featur es of the contemporar y America n

political lands cape— can foster gridlock (Binder 2014; McCarty,

Poole, and Rosenthal 2006; for an alternative perspective on di-

vided government, see Mayhew 1991). From the perspective of

an individual leg islator, this state of affairs may be problematic.

Cooperating with the opp osing party may be unappeali ng to leg-

islators in an era of stark polarization. On the other h and, al-

though legislators can a nd do take credit for legislative efforts

that do not ultimately yield new policy, they have incentives to

accumulate policy achieveme nts that they can claim credit for

in order to enhanc e their re- election prospec ts (Mayhew 1974;

Wea ve r 2 018).

When there is leg islative gridlock, m embers are li mited in

their opportunities for credit clai ming and may fear that voters

will blame them for legislative failures. These fears may be well-

founded. Voters’ perceptions of who is to blame for phenomena

ranging from a f lagging ec onomy to recovery efforts following a