Strength in Numbers: How Polls Work and Why We Need Them

by G. Elliott Morris

Overview

An insightful exploration of political polling and a bold defense of its crucial role in a modern democracy.

Public opinion polling is the ultimate democratic process; it gives every person an equal voice in letting elected leaders know what they need and want. But in the eyes of the public, polls today are tarnished. Recent election forecasts have routinely missed the mark and media coverage of polls has focused solely on their ability to predict winners and losers. Polls deserve better.

In Strength in Numbers, data journalist G. Elliott Morris argues that the larger purpose of political polls is to improve democracy, not just predict elections. Whether used by interest groups, the press, or politicians, polling serves as a pipeline from the governed to the government, giving citizens influence they would otherwise lack. No one who believes in democracy can afford to give up on polls; they should commit, instead, to understanding them better.

In a vibrant history of polling, Morris takes readers from the first semblance of data-gathering in the ancient world through to the development of modern-day scientific polling. He explains how the internet and “big data” have solved many challenges in polling—and created others. He covers the rise of polling aggregation and methods of election forecasting, reveals how data can be distorted and misrepresented, and demystifies the real uncertainty of polling. Candidly acknowledging where polls have gone wrong in the past, Morris charts a path for the industry’s future where it can truly work for the people.

Persuasively argued and deeply researched, Strength in Numbers is an essential guide to understanding and embracing one of the most important and overlooked democratic institutions in the United States.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393866971
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	07/12/2022
Pages:	224
Sales rank:	240,178
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

G. Elliott Morris is a data journalist for the Economist, where he writes about American politics and elections. He lives in Washington, DC.

Table of Contents

Introduction ix

1 Democracy and the Public Will 1

2 Polling Comes of Age 30

3 Machine Politics 55

4 One Bad Apple Doesn't Spoil the Bushel 79

5 America in Aggregate 101

6 Big Data and Black Boxes 121

7 Taking the Pulse of the Pulse of Democracy 149

Conclusion 165

Acknowledgments 179

Notes 182

Index 195

Editorial Reviews

05/09/2022

Economist journalist Morris debuts with a detailed rundown of how public opinion polling has evolved from ancient Greece to the present day and why it is essential for democratic societies. Contending that polls “shape the government’s understanding of what the people want from their leaders,” Morris traces the concept that public opinion, or the “general will,” should guide the processes of lawmaking and governing to Enlightenment philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau and notes that the first published straw polls appeared during the 1824 U.S. presidential election. Elsewhere, Morris recounts how George Gallup’s efforts to better measure the interests of newspaper readers helped make him “the father of modern public opinion surveys” in the 20th century; explains the numerous factors that contribute to inaccurate polls, including sampling errors, refusals by certain types of respondents to participate, and imprecise or biased questions; and describes how polls can be used to manipulate public opinion. Though Morris’s discussions of technical matters, including the “raking” algorithm pollsters use to determine whether their surveys are representative, can be heavy going, he makes a persuasive case for the necessity of polling and the need to better educate the public about how it works. Political junkies and policy analysts will savor this informative deep dive. (July)

Publishers Weekly

"Strength in Numbers provides an engaging and illuminating journey from the earliest days of polling to the challenges that the survey industry is currently facing. What Morris’s enlightening book shows us is that pollsters have always faced—and ultimately overcome—obstacles in their attempts to accurately capture public opinion. Why should the current moment be any different, especially when we need polls now more than ever to help fulfill the promise of a government that responds to the wishes and demands of its people."

Brian Schaffner

"I can’t count the number of times people have asked me to explain polling and its errors. In the future my answer will simply be, ‘Read G. Elliott Morris’s superb book, Strength in Numbers.’ With a volume rich in useful detail and relevant history, Morris explains what has gone wrong with surveys in recent years and, more important, how to make public opinion polling better."

Larry J. Sabato

"This book reads like a suspenseful whodunnit, tragedy, and love story for data. Packed with surprising history, fresh insights, and wise reforms, this is a landmark work that everyone who cares about society and politics must read."

Kenneth Cukier

"A vibrant and compelling intellectual history of polling that will make you a much smarter and savvier reader of all those polls."

Lee Drutman

"Morris provides a well-reported and thoughtful defense of the polls, while acknowledging their limitations. Strength in Numbers makes a timely and valuable contribution to the polling literature."

Karlyn Bowman

"In this lively story of the struggles and successes of polling from Gallup to the present day, Morris makes a convincing case that the measurement of public opinion is a key component of modern democracy."

Andrew Gelman

"Many Americans may be ready to give up on polls, but through this engaging history of public-opinion research, Elliott Morris makes the case that they make our politics better, not worse. And he’s brimming with urgent ideas for how all of us—citizens, journalists, pollsters, and politicians—can make better use of a tool essential to a healthy democracy."

Sasha Issenberg

"A compelling, accessible, and needed history lesson on the place of public opinion in our politics and a clearheaded rejoinder to the poll-bashers."

Carlos Odio

06/01/2022

American journalist Morris, a writer for the Economist, analyzes public opinion polls and pollsters, maintaining that they more reliably report trends, similar to weather forecasts, than provide unassailable predictions. He dissuades readers from dismissing polls and faults researchers for overemphasizing the easily accessible views of highly educated people. The increased use of multi-day voting, when not all citizens react to the same recent events, and the tendency for less enthusiastic constituents to forgo optional balloting further skew surveys' veracity. Polling persists because it apprises officeholders of popular causes. The horse race nature arguably excites both pundits and the populace. Librarians should note that there are few recent comprehensive print monographs on polling; statistician Nate Silver (The Signal and the Noise) and others usually prefer blogs and websites. VERDICT This book's lucid language explains techniques such as manipulative push and unofficial straw polls, while setting the topic in its historical context.—Frederick J. Augustyn Jr.

Library Journal

2022-04-26
A data journalist for the Economist explains his much-derided and now much-distrusted profession.

In the 2020 presidential election, a poll taken by ABC News and the Washington Post projected that Joe Biden would defeat Donald Trump in Wisconsin by a towering 17 percentage points. Ultimately, Biden’s lead was less than 1 point. How did the pollsters get it so wrong? In 2016, how did everyone who called the election for Hillary Clinton misread the signs? Morris looks deep inside the often flawed assumptions of the pollsters and efforts to overcome the mathematical flaws inherent in their surveys, from sample bias to margins of error. Before doing so, however, he defends the use of polls as an important mechanism to give voice to voters in a representative democracy. “We must understand that both the concept and the significance of public opinion took root gradually, and their development continues to this day,” he writes. When properly conducted, he adds, a poll can have the force of a referendum, given that a key assumption of democracies is that the voice of the collective is stronger than that of the individual. But how to assemble that collective to give meaningful results? As Morris notes, some of the problem lies on the side of the pollsters, who must attain samples sufficiently large and diverse to represent as many demographics as possible. Some, though, lies on the side of those being polled, who, it seems, tend not to answer truthfully, especially when they suspect that the poll is biased toward one end or another. In the 2020 election, right-leaning voters tended not to respond to polls at all, again leading to projections of a Biden landslide. Those readers with a bent for statistics will take interest in the author’s descriptions of such matters as sampling errors, the law of large numbers, and the corrective tools of smoothing and aggregation.

Morris makes a solid case for polls as tools to give voice to the people while allowing that improvements are needed.

Kirkus Reviews