The expertise paradox: how policy expertise can hinder responsiveness

Pereira, Miguel ORCID: 0000-0001-6621-9863 and Öhberg, Patrik (2024) The expertise paradox: how policy expertise can hinder responsiveness. British Journal of Political Science, 54 (2). 474 - 491. ISSN 0007-1234

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Abstract

We argue that policy expertise constrains the ability of politicians to act on voter preferences. Representatives with more knowledge and experience in a given domain have more confidence in their own issue-specific positions. Enhanced confidence, in turn, may lead politicians to discount opinions they disagree with, producing a distorted image of the electorate. Two experiments with Swedish politicians support this argument. First, officials are more likely to dismiss appeals from voters in their areas of expertise and less likely to accept that opposing views may represent the majority opinion. Consistent with the proposed mechanism, in a second experiment we show that inducing perceptions of expertise increases self-confidence. The results suggest that representatives with more specialized knowledge in a given area may be less capable of acting as delegates in that domain. The study provides a novel explanation for variations in policy responsiveness.

Item Type:	Article
Official URL:	https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/british-jo...
Additional Information:	© 2023 The Authors
Divisions:	European Institute
Subjects:	J Political Science > JF Political institutions (General) J Political Science > JC Political theory
Date Deposited:	19 Jul 2023 11:06
Last Modified:	19 Dec 2024 00:50
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/119761

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