| dc.description.abstract |
<p>In a democratic society, does the electorate approve of truth and disapprove of
deception, do opinion patterns exclusively mimic partisan elite views, or do opinion
patterns react exclusively to successful or failed outcomes? Do citizens hold leaders
accountable for the perceived truthfulness of foreign policy claims or do they only
evaluate whether or not the policies were successful? The existing literature on public
opinion and foreign policy calls the accountability role for the public "audience
costs," and specifies that concerns about audience costs constrain leaders. However,
the literature is not clear on what role normative issues may play in generating audience
costs. This gap in the literature is notable because so much of the debate surrounding
significant policy issues, especially war-making and military action, is couched in
retrospective, normative, moralizing language. These debates make no sense if the
pragmatic, forward-looking dimensions of audience costs - reliability and success
- are all that exist. Through a survey experiment and four historical case studies
developed with primary and secondary historical sources, news articles, and polling
data, I find that there is a complex dynamic at work between the public's desire for
successful outcomes and the high value placed upon truth-telling and transparency
within a democracy. Studying justifications for military action and war, I find that
the public will be motivated to punish leaders perceived as deceptive, but that imposition
of audience costs will be moderated by factors including partisanship, degree of elite
unity, and the leader's damage control strategy in response to disapproval.</p>
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