This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Pippen, J. Articles by Donovan, T. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                   What's this?

Election Reform and Direct Democracy: Campaign Finance Regulations in the American States

University of California, Riverside

Shaun Bowler

University of California, Riverside

Todd Donovan

Western Washington University

Changes in rules governing how legislators seek office, such as term limits, open primary laws,and regulations on campaign contributions, might not always find majority support in a state legislature.Direct democracy provides groups advocating such policies with an extra method forshaping the public agenda, a method that is absent in noninitiative states. This may lead initiativestates to implement different electoral laws than noninitiative states. We test if direct democracyis associated with the regulations a state places on contributions to legislative candidates. Wefind that states with frequent initiative use placed more restrictions on contributors between 1984and 1998 and that initiative states were more likely than noninitiative states to increase regulationson contributions from political parties and political action committees.

Key Words: campaign finance • political reform • direct democracy • ballot initiatives

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this?