From Polling to Policy

It was obvious our speaker knew a lot about the polling work she does and about the history of think tanks. She seemed to be the Jane-of-all-trades at the think tank where she works and that was an inspiring role to see. Additionally, her insight into the history of public opinion allowed the class to hear about the continuity, change and contradictions over time in the United States that I didn’t get from the reading.

The continuity in polls over time has been on topics concerning foreign affairs and religion. However, there has been slight changes recently. The subtle increase in the number of Americans who believe we should stay out of war seems to be related to the Trump administration. We have always had a religious country, but since the growth of generation Z and millennials, the number of people with no religious affiliation has grown. One of the more notable progressive changes that has occurred over time is the support for a women president. The belief that a woman could effectively run the country has increased from 33 percent in 1933 to 96 percent in this last election. The polls concerning the ability of a Catholic, Muslim, African-American, or Gay person to be a good president has also increased significantly over time. The most fascinating information for me to hear about was the popular contradictions within the American public. For example, in general, the public wants to have a strong military, but does not want to send troops abroad. Contradictions like these have some logical sense, however, it is hard to build policy in such a grey area. Our speaker even mentioned this when discussing civic responsibility because most people tend to stay out of the controversy when there are contradictions. This fear of controversy paired with the difficulties of being an informed and involved citizen today reflect the unstable basis of polls for policy. The speaker was quick to point out how these characteristics of polls and the public opinion should not directly influence policy.

The reading and our guest mentioned the need to stay involved in politics. But even our reading explained that civic duties today are much more extensive than back in the day. Because of the fast pace world we are in and the internet’s ability to spread news so quickly, politics are much harder to always be on top of. However, unlike our reading, the speaker stated several times throughout our meeting that “polls are too crude/blunt to decide policy, but can learn about American society from them.” In an ideal democracy, public opinion directly shapes policy, but because of the system of democracy here, our elected officials do not necessary have to listen to the public. Also, in America, there is a lot of room for money and therefore, a lot of room for outside influence.

It surprised me that polls have only been asking about emotions since the 80’s, since emotions carry so much weight in someone’s thought process most of the time. Emotions, however, are another reason to take every poll with a grain of salt since you don’t know how the people being polled felt that day. Another issue with using polls to influence policy that was talked about both the speaker and the reading is the lack of nuance in the polling questions. As I stated earlier, there are contradicting beliefs sometimes and certain circumstances where polling cannot address these specific issues of a political opinion. Lastly, it was comforting to know that she believed most politicians did not base their policy on polls alone, but on their personal convictions.

I appreciated her take on the role media has played in polling because we tend to get caught up in all the fake news scandal, but polling is affected by the competitive media environment. Everyone wants an accurate poll to back up their claim on the news, so pollsters tend to cater the topics of their poll to what the news outlets will need. Our speaker pointed out how this limits the polling. Polling is used to know the public opinion on anything, not just politics. She shared with us that America’s favorite color is blue and has been for quite some time. I agree with her that polls like this are necessary even though they may not be related to the news scandal of the day. Our speaker also addressed the failure to trust polls today because of mistaken predictions like the 2016 election and Brexit. She discussed the decline of the polling business and projected it would be about ten years or so before the whole business became obsolete. I hope polling finds a way to change their dependence on the political media because polls allow our citizens to see how our society progresses over time.