International Status and Support for Political Leaders

• In Event: Experimental Research on the Psychology of Conflict Bargaining

Abstract

Over the past two decades, our understanding of how international politics affects domestic support for political leaders has been strongly shaped by theories of audience costs. We argue that this emphasis, while not misplaced, is incomplete. We draw on the burgeoning literature on status in international relations to show that, regardless of the foreign policy choices that leaders make, their performance in executing those policies matters because it affects the status that states enjoy in the international system. We use experiments embedded in a survey of the U.S. public and recent advancements in causal mediation analysis to demonstrate that international status concerns are an important determinant of public evaluations of political leaders. We show that international status concerns are important across a diverse set of issue areas. Ultimately, we conclude that international status concerns are an important determinant of citizen evaluations of political leaders and that there should be renewed emphasis how public opinion might affect international politics.

Author

• Ryan M. Powers, University of Georgia