In the wake of public crises, political “blame games” can lead to bad public policies

When things go wrong, such as when disasters and other crises occur, politicians often look to assign blame in order to gain political capital. But how do members of the public react when politicians and public servants apportion blame? Using the April 2013 Boston Marathon bombings as a case study, John Marvel finds that an individual’s sense of who is to blame depends on who is doing the blaming, and who is being blamed. He argues that such ‘blame games’ can have an effect on which government policy responses people are willing to support to address future crises.