Because People Can’t Be Represented If We Don’t Know What They Think
Wendy Naus
At the heart of democratic governance is the notion that what government
does should be responsive to what people want. To reflect citizens’
desires, political leaders need to have a sense of which policies most
people would prefer, what kinds of concerns they have, and ideally why they
are making the choices they are making. Public opinion polling is the
primary vehicle through which the desires, hopes, and preferences of
members of the public trickle up to influence the decisions of soci