Andrew Little
@anthlittle.bsky.social
Prof at UC Berkeley. Formal theory, political beliefs, democracy.
Associate Editor at @ajpseditor.bsky.social
https://anthlittle.github.io/
Associate Editor at @ajpseditor.bsky.social
https://anthlittle.github.io/
Pinned
Andrew Little
@anthlittle.bsky.social
· Feb 27
New paper! @annemeng.bsky.social's thread lays out the key findings, but the v short version is (1) concessions are rising, (2) but primarily for unfair elections, (3) incumbents concede much more and this is probably causal, (4) weak evidence for conceding being a norm osf.io/preprints/os...
When teaching accountability models I sometimes describe the incumbent action as "taking money from the treasury" and have to explain that this need not be literal. Maybe not anymore!
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/u...
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/u...
Trump Said to Demand Justice Dept. Pay Him $230 Million for Past Cases
www.nytimes.com
October 21, 2025 at 6:36 PM
When teaching accountability models I sometimes describe the incumbent action as "taking money from the treasury" and have to explain that this need not be literal. Maybe not anymore!
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/u...
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/u...
I don’t think this should primarily be described as autocratic rather just extremely stupid and embarassing. Not autocracy, clownocracy.
Deputy AG Blanche: RICO is available to all kinds of organizations committing crimes and committing wrongful acts… So is it sheer happenstance that individuals show up at a restaurant where the president is trying to enjoy dinner and accost him with vile words?
September 17, 2025 at 2:48 AM
I don’t think this should primarily be described as autocratic rather just extremely stupid and embarassing. Not autocracy, clownocracy.
Reposted by Andrew Little
Ok - so I'm going to do a real context+write up but for now, here's what some of these things look like.
To start my data reference is DCinbox which is ~208,000 official e-newsletters over the past 15 years.
To start my data reference is DCinbox which is ~208,000 official e-newsletters over the past 15 years.
August 22, 2025 at 6:13 PM
Ok - so I'm going to do a real context+write up but for now, here's what some of these things look like.
To start my data reference is DCinbox which is ~208,000 official e-newsletters over the past 15 years.
To start my data reference is DCinbox which is ~208,000 official e-newsletters over the past 15 years.
Reposted by Andrew Little
The CCP’s triumph over the KMT shocked the world—even the Soviets bet on the KMT with more aid. My book, Domination and Mobilization, asks: how did the CCP survive and prevail?
Domination and Mobilization offers three fresh arguments that explain the reversal of the century. 👇
cup.org/3G6WKB2
Domination and Mobilization offers three fresh arguments that explain the reversal of the century. 👇
cup.org/3G6WKB2
August 22, 2025 at 5:43 PM
The CCP’s triumph over the KMT shocked the world—even the Soviets bet on the KMT with more aid. My book, Domination and Mobilization, asks: how did the CCP survive and prevail?
Domination and Mobilization offers three fresh arguments that explain the reversal of the century. 👇
cup.org/3G6WKB2
Domination and Mobilization offers three fresh arguments that explain the reversal of the century. 👇
cup.org/3G6WKB2
Very happy to share this paper: Like it says on the tin, we study how simplifying assumptions drive overprecision (excessive certainty) and disagreement (divergence in beliefs), using theory, an experiment, and observational data.
Draft here: osf.io/preprints/os...
Quick thread below.
Draft here: osf.io/preprints/os...
Quick thread below.
August 22, 2025 at 6:51 PM
Very happy to share this paper: Like it says on the tin, we study how simplifying assumptions drive overprecision (excessive certainty) and disagreement (divergence in beliefs), using theory, an experiment, and observational data.
Draft here: osf.io/preprints/os...
Quick thread below.
Draft here: osf.io/preprints/os...
Quick thread below.
Using LLMs as a sounding board has helped me solve a lot of technical problems, or at least solve them faster than I would have otherwise. But when you do this on a topic you know well you realize they make a ton of mistakes (while exhibiting 100% confidence) that a non-expert wouldn't catch.
I think it's probably really useful to have LLMs act as a sounding board/sparring partner for experts tbh but Travis Kalanick talking to Grok about quantum physics, or to anyone else about anything else, is not that
July 16, 2025 at 4:17 AM
Using LLMs as a sounding board has helped me solve a lot of technical problems, or at least solve them faster than I would have otherwise. But when you do this on a topic you know well you realize they make a ton of mistakes (while exhibiting 100% confidence) that a non-expert wouldn't catch.
I've seen editors of journals say this before but being on the other side can confirm: the easiest zero-cost way to speed up the review process is to quickly turn down requests to review that you can't do.
July 9, 2025 at 9:53 PM
I've seen editors of journals say this before but being on the other side can confirm: the easiest zero-cost way to speed up the review process is to quickly turn down requests to review that you can't do.
The GOB presidency
youtu.be/APWXorE6h8U?...
youtu.be/APWXorE6h8U?...
May 28, 2025 at 11:32 PM
The GOB presidency
youtu.be/APWXorE6h8U?...
youtu.be/APWXorE6h8U?...
Maybe a good day to recommend this podcast on the Whitmer kidnapping plot. Those convicted were far from blameless, but closer to "jokers strung along by government informants" than criminal masterminds. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...
The Michigan Plot I 1. The Man in the Vac-Shack Basement
Podcast Episode · Chameleon: Dr. Miracle · S7 E1 · 41m
podcasts.apple.com
May 28, 2025 at 11:29 PM
Maybe a good day to recommend this podcast on the Whitmer kidnapping plot. Those convicted were far from blameless, but closer to "jokers strung along by government informants" than criminal masterminds. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...
I’m generally on team “talking about Abrego Garcia is good both politically and morally” and this is clever but I’d want to see if the treatment durably shifts beliefs before reading too much into it. Would guess this is mostly changing how people interpret the Q.
Rare for a public poll, we did a survey experiment to test whether priming respondents about the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia impacts support for Trump's broader immigration agenda. It does. Support for blanket deportations fell 20 points after hearing about Garcia's case.
May 14, 2025 at 2:47 PM
I’m generally on team “talking about Abrego Garcia is good both politically and morally” and this is clever but I’d want to see if the treatment durably shifts beliefs before reading too much into it. Would guess this is mostly changing how people interpret the Q.
Bumping in case anyone has leads?
I recently saw a paper where subjects had to do something like write arguments that they thought sounded like what out party members would say about a topic, with the result that it was hard to tell apart “real R” vs “D pretending to be R” args. Anyone know where to find this?
May 8, 2025 at 8:51 PM
Bumping in case anyone has leads?
I recently saw a paper where subjects had to do something like write arguments that they thought sounded like what out party members would say about a topic, with the result that it was hard to tell apart “real R” vs “D pretending to be R” args. Anyone know where to find this?
May 7, 2025 at 9:37 PM
I recently saw a paper where subjects had to do something like write arguments that they thought sounded like what out party members would say about a topic, with the result that it was hard to tell apart “real R” vs “D pretending to be R” args. Anyone know where to find this?
As someone who thought we should avoid confident claims about the best messaging to oppose Trump very early on, I'm now pretty convinced that this is true. Though I'll stand by the claim that we should have expressed uncertainty, and am not sure earlier strident opposition would have changed a ton.
i will say again that given the trajectory of the white house so far, strident opposition a la 2017 would have absolutely been the most prudent and effective decision and the absence of that opposition in the first two months made things demonstrably worse.
May 1, 2025 at 2:54 PM
As someone who thought we should avoid confident claims about the best messaging to oppose Trump very early on, I'm now pretty convinced that this is true. Though I'll stand by the claim that we should have expressed uncertainty, and am not sure earlier strident opposition would have changed a ton.
Reposted by Andrew Little
Power corrupts. It’s time for Singapore to become a democracy.
Opinion | My Father Founded Singapore. He Would Be Troubled by What It’s Become. (Gift Article)
The nation’s current leaders are not living up to my father’s high standards of governance, and Singapore is suffering as a result.
www.nytimes.com
May 1, 2025 at 2:50 AM
Power corrupts. It’s time for Singapore to become a democracy.
Great paper! Perhaps the team is already doing this but it would be great to see what studies using expert coded data do and don’t replicate when using the predicted values.
A few years ago, @danweitzel.net, John Gerring, @skaaning.bsky.social and I were curious how well one could predict subjective democracy measures using easy(ish) to code observables. Turns out, *quite* well, even out of sample. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
April 30, 2025 at 9:39 PM
Great paper! Perhaps the team is already doing this but it would be great to see what studies using expert coded data do and don’t replicate when using the predicted values.
Getting close to the Manksi bounds here
"Are you ready for this, media?" -- Bondi turns to the press and credits Trump for saving "258 million lives"
April 30, 2025 at 8:59 PM
Getting close to the Manksi bounds here
Happy to see more people joining team “Trump is too short-sighted and incompetent to effectively dismantle democracy”!
I've spent years reporting on how democracies die. And I've noticed something: by international standards, Donald Trump is really, really bad at destroying a democracy.
And that should give us real reason for hope. www.vox.com/politics/410...
And that should give us real reason for hope. www.vox.com/politics/410...
Trump is losing his war on democracy
Trump’s power grabs are dangerous. But he’s going about them all wrong — and facing effective resistance as a result.
www.vox.com
April 30, 2025 at 2:42 PM
Happy to see more people joining team “Trump is too short-sighted and incompetent to effectively dismantle democracy”!
Wouldn’t be surprised if Canada is the start of a wave of left parties winning elections across the world.
April 29, 2025 at 3:44 AM
Wouldn’t be surprised if Canada is the start of a wave of left parties winning elections across the world.
Reposted by Andrew Little
Many formal checks and balances in DC have failed but other checks seem to be holding up:
— National mass protest
— Courts (to a degree)
— Powers like voting decentralized to states
— Political culture that’s skeptical of autocracy
— Big country that sustains pockets of resistance.
What else?
— National mass protest
— Courts (to a degree)
— Powers like voting decentralized to states
— Political culture that’s skeptical of autocracy
— Big country that sustains pockets of resistance.
What else?
April 29, 2025 at 2:22 AM
Many formal checks and balances in DC have failed but other checks seem to be holding up:
— National mass protest
— Courts (to a degree)
— Powers like voting decentralized to states
— Political culture that’s skeptical of autocracy
— Big country that sustains pockets of resistance.
What else?
— National mass protest
— Courts (to a degree)
— Powers like voting decentralized to states
— Political culture that’s skeptical of autocracy
— Big country that sustains pockets of resistance.
What else?
Also if you zoom out globally, 2020 was a good year for incumbents, 2016 and particularly 2024 were good years for challengers, and the entire period has been favorable to more right-wing politicians.
Many really want the interesting question to be about Trump's personal electoral strengths, but the best explanation of 2024, 2016, and mostly 2020 is that he mostly performed as a generic Republican - and if there's a question here, it's why voters treat him that way.
Polisci did it again. One of the most accurate predictions of the pres. election is taking the simple average or median of the pre-election models from this issue (in print now but published in October). We are good.
2-party predictions: Harris 49.8 and 246 EC.
Actual 2-party: 49.24 and 226 EC.
2-party predictions: Harris 49.8 and 246 EC.
Actual 2-party: 49.24 and 226 EC.
April 28, 2025 at 6:13 PM
Also if you zoom out globally, 2020 was a good year for incumbents, 2016 and particularly 2024 were good years for challengers, and the entire period has been favorable to more right-wing politicians.
Such a clear collective action problem for Rs in moderate districts. If they band together to push back against the craziest part of Trumpism they might survive the midterms. If not he will continue to plummet and they will get wiped out.
Nothing to be scared of here in political terms. One of the least popular presidents is now even less popular than he was in his first term. People need to come out from under rocks.
April 28, 2025 at 5:47 PM
Such a clear collective action problem for Rs in moderate districts. If they band together to push back against the craziest part of Trumpism they might survive the midterms. If not he will continue to plummet and they will get wiped out.
So the guy who wrote “it’s time to build” just spends all day texting his buddies? www.semafor.com/article/04/2...
The group chats that changed America
A loose private network on Signal and WhatsApp helped usher in the new alliance between Silicon Valley and Donald Trump’s new right.
www.semafor.com
April 28, 2025 at 2:56 PM
So the guy who wrote “it’s time to build” just spends all day texting his buddies? www.semafor.com/article/04/2...
2016-2020 was the term of the 🤡. 2024-2028 looking like the term of the 🐓.
This is the essence of Trumpism. Lots bravado but very little backbone. On the domestic front, it’s exactly why civil society should be standing up rather than buckling to his bullying. It won’t take much for him to fold.
The guys in the White House talk all day about how soft the Europeans are. But when there is an actual war in the actual world, the Trump people immediately submit to what they think is the stronger side and complain that everyone else doesn’t do the same.
April 24, 2025 at 2:50 PM
2016-2020 was the term of the 🤡. 2024-2028 looking like the term of the 🐓.
Don’t regret deleting my account but do wish I could easily follow this
This person I follow on the other place keeps a running thread of Trump administration shenanigans paired with episode titles in the style of It’s Always Sunny and I think “The Gang Files a Letter” might be the funniest one yet
April 24, 2025 at 4:10 AM
Don’t regret deleting my account but do wish I could easily follow this