This article explores the relationship between public opinion and nonincremental policy change by extending the analysis of Wright et al. (1985, 1987). We develop a two-step model in which we first relate the level of a relevant outcome measure of a policy to the degree of opinion liberalism, the strategy of Wright and his colleagues. Then we posit that policy shocks will move the policy system into greater policy-opinion congruence. The model is tested for two policy areas that have undergone nonincremental change over the late 1970s and early 1980s: tax policy and education policy.
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