John Engler, former Governor of Michigan, once claimed that redistricting is one of the purest actions a legislative body can take. Academicians and political leaders alike, however, have regularly debated the ideal way by to redistrict national and state legislatures. Rather than being the pure process that Governor Engler envisioned, redistricting has led to repeated court battles waged on such traditional democratic values as one person, one vote, and minority rights. Instead of being an opportunity to help ensure maximum representation for the citizens, the process has become a cat and mouse game in many states with citizen representation seemingly the farthest idea from anyone's mind. From a purely political perspective, those in power in the state legislature at the time of redistricting largely act like they have unilateral authority to do as they please. In this volume, contributors discuss why such an assumption is concerning in the modern political environment.

"Whether responding to a CNN.com survey or voting for the NFL All-Pro team, computer users are becoming more and more comfortable with Internet polls. Computer use in the United States continues to grow-more than half of all American households now have a personal computer. The next question, then, becomes obvious. Should Americans be able to use the Internet in the most important polls of all? Some advocates of Internet voting argue that Americans are well suited to casting their ballots online in political elections. They are eager to make use of new technology, and they have relatively broad access to the Internet. Voting would become easier for people stuck at home, at the office, or on the road. Internet voting might encourage greater political participation among young adults, a group that stays away from the polling place in droves. It would hold special appeal for military personnel overseas, whose ability to vote is a growing concern. There are serious concerns, however, regarding computer security and voter fraud, unequal Internet access across socioeconomic lines (the ""digital divide""), and the civic consequences of moving elections away from schools and other polling places and into private homes and offices. After all, showing up to vote is the most public civic activity many Americans engage in, and it is often their only overt participation in the democratic process. In Point, Click, and Vote, voting experts Michael Alvarez and Thad Hall make a strong case for greater experimentation with Internet voting. In their words, ""There is no way to know whether any argument regarding Internet voting is accurate unless real Internet voting systems are tested, and they should be tested in small-scale, scientific trials so that their successes and failures can be evaluated."" In other words, you never know until you try, and it's time to try harder. The authors offer a realistic plan for putting pilot remote Internet voting programs into effect nationwide. Such programs would allow U.S. voters in selected areas to cast their ballots over any Internet connection; they would not even need to leave home. If these pilot programs are successful, the next step is to consider how they might be implemented on a larger scale in future elections. "

From Afghanistan to Zimbabwe the world has witnessed a rising tide of contentious elections ending in heated partisan debates, court challenges, street protests, and legitimacy challenges. In some cases, disputes have been settled peacefully through legal appeals and electoral reforms. In the worst cases, however, disputes have triggered bloodshed or government downfalls and military coups. Contentious elections are characterized by major challenges, with different degrees of severity, to the legitimacy of electoral actors, procedures, or outcomes. Despite growing concern, until recently little research has studied this phenomenon. The theory unfolded in this volume suggests that problems of electoral malpractice erode confidence in electoral authorities, spur peaceful protests demonstrating against the outcome, and, in the most severe cases, lead to outbreaks of conflict and violence. Understanding this process is of vital concern for domestic reformers and the international community, as well as attracting a growing new research agenda. The editors, from the Electoral Integrity Project, bring together scholars considering a range of fresh evidence- analyzing public opinion surveys of confidence in elections and voter turnout within specific countries, as well as expert perceptions of the existence of peaceful electoral demonstrations, and survey and aggregate data monitoring outbreaks of electoral violence. The book provides insights invaluable for studies in democracy and democratization, comparative politics, comparative elections, peace and conflict studies, comparative sociology, international development, comparative public opinion, political behavior, political institutions, and public policy.

Franklin Roosevelt was not only the first US president to be covered by public opinion polls, but his ratings have consistently exceeded those of all subsequent sitting presidents, save for John F. Kennedy. Moreover, Roosevelt also stands out with a popular appeal that is unsurpassed by any of his successors serving at least a full term. The key to his approval, as this book shows, was wartime leadership, not economic performance. It began with policies preparing the nation for war in the two years before formal entry. To use FDR's own coinage, it was making the United States the "arsenal of democracy" in the battle against tyranny. That pursuit, not the New Deal, earned him high marks with the American people and re-election to an unprecedented third term. World War II-and its heavy human toll-did nothing to diminish FDR's popularity. As such, the FDR experience defies major paradigms of presidential politics. Yet, Roosevelt has been relatively ignored by scholars of public opinion. What can FDR's experience teach us and his successors about rousing broad public support, particularly during wartime? What light does his success shed on the failures of Presidents Truman, Johnson, and George W. Bush in Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq? On key issues, mainly with foreign policy, FDR had to contend with an American public that opposed his plans at the outset. Helmut Norpoth argues that Roosevelt had an unparalleled ability for leadership, especially through the fabled "fireside chats" and his appreciation of opinion polls, that enabled him to move the public to embrace his policies. In this book, Norpoth takes an in-depth look at how FDR's leadership swayed public opinion, comparing his experience to his successors to draw broad conclusions about what makes for successful presidential politics.

Barbara Burrell presents a comprehensive comparative examination of men's and women's candidacies for the U.S. House of Representatives in elections from 1994 through 2012. Analyzing extensive data sets on all major party candidates for 10 elections - covering candidate status, party affiliation, fund-raising, candidate background variables, votes obtained, and success rates for both primary and general elections - Burrell finds little evidence of categorical discrimination against women candidates. Women compete equally with men and often outpace them in raising money, gaining interest group and political party support, and winning elections. Yet the number of women elected to the U.S. House has expanded only incrementally. The electoral structure limits opportunities for newcomers to win congressional seats and there remains a lower presence of women in winnable contests despite growing recruitment efforts. Burrell suggests that congressional dysfunction discourages potential candidates from pursuing legislative careers and that ambitious women are finding alternative paths to influence and affect public policy.

The vivid, behind-the-scenes story of perhaps the most consequential political moment in American history—Abraham Lincoln’s history-changing nomination to lead the Republican Party in the 1860 presidential election Illinois lawyer Abraham Lincoln had a record of political failure. In 1858, he had lost a celebrated Senate bid against incumbent Stephen Douglas, his second failed Senate run, and had not held public office since one term in Congress a decade earlier. As the Republican National Convention opened in mid-May 1860 in Chicago, powerful New York Senator William Seward was the overwhelming favorite for the presidential nomination, with notables like Salmon Chase and Edward Bates in the running. Few thought Lincoln stood a chance—though stubborn Illinois circuit Judge David Davis had come to fight for his friend anyway. Such was the political landscape as Edward Achorn’s The Lincoln Miracle opens on Saturday, May 12, 1860. Chronicling the tense political drama as it unfolded over the next six days, Achorn explores the genius of Lincoln’s quiet strategy, the vicious partisanship tearing apart America, the fierce battles raging over racism and slavery, and booming Chicago as a symbol of the modernization transforming the nation. Closely following the shrewd insiders on hand, from Seward power broker Thurlow Weed to editor Horace Greeley — bent on stopping his former friend, Seward—Achorn brings alive arguably the most consequential political story in America’s history. From smoky hotel rooms to night marches by the Wide Awakes, the new Republican youth organization, to fiery speeches on the floor of the giant convention center called The Wigwam, Achorn portrays a political climate even more contentious than our own today, out of which the seemingly impossible long shot prevailed, to the nation’s everlasting benefit. As atmospheric and original as Achorn’s previous Every Drop of Blood, The Lincoln Miracle is essential reading for any Lincoln aficionado as it is for anyone who cares about our nation’s history.

Now updated to include the 2014 midterms and preview the coming 2016 election cycle, After Hope and Change provides the most comprehensive and authoritative account of the national election, including the presidential nomination process and election and congressional elections. As they have for every national election since 1992, James W. Ceaser and Andrew E. Busch, now joined by John J. Pitney, Jr., combine a concise account of the elections as well as the broader context for American politics and institutions. Previous books in the series After Hope and Change: The 2012 Elections and American Politics Epic Journey: The 2008 Elections and American Politics Red Over Blue: The 2004 Elections and American Politics The Perfect Tie: The True Story of the 2000 Presidential Election Losing to Win: The 1996 Elections and American Politics Upside Down and Inside Out: The 1992 Elections and American Politics

On 5 June 1975, voters went to the polls in Britain's first national referendum to decide whether the UK should remain in the European Community. As in 2016, the campaign shattered old political allegiances and triggered a far-reaching debate on Britain's place in the world. The campaign to stay in stretched from the Conservative Party - under its new leader, Margaret Thatcher - to the Labour government, the farming unions and the Confederation of British Industry. Those fighting to 'Get Britain Out' ranged from Enoch Powell and Tony Benn to Scottish and Welsh nationalists. Footballers, actors and celebrities joined the campaign trail, as did clergymen, students, women's groups and paramilitaries. In a panoramic survey of 1970s Britain, this volume offers the first modern history of the referendum, asking why voters said 'Yes to Europe' and why the result did not, as some hoped, bring the European debate in Britain to a close.

The United States is experiencing remarkable demographic changes that are having an important impact on the American electorate. As the minority share of the voting-eligible population continues to grow, the political clout of non-Hispanic whites will further decline. The 2012 election demonstrated that the Democratic Party can secure an Electoral College victory even when it loses badly, in the aggregate, among non-Hispanic whites. This does not mean that white voters are unimportant, however. The political behavior of whites in the decades ahead will largely determine the direction of American politics.

This book examines the political behavior of non-Hispanic whites. It considers the trends within the white vote, how white voters differ geographically, and the primary fault lines among white voters. It also examines how white political behavior changes in response to diversity. It considers whether or not the day is approaching when whites consolidate into a largely homogenous voting bloc, or whether whites will remain politically heterogeneous in the decades ahead

Whereas other books have examined the political behavior of specific social classes within the non-Hispanic white community (working class whites, for example), this is the first book to examine whites as a whole, and provide a useful summary of recent trends within this group and thoughtful speculation about its future.

Is the election result in a constituency affected by the amount of campaign spending there? This book, originally published in 1987 was the first major study of this important question. Based on extensive original research, it addresses two main issues: the impact of constituency campaign spending on election results in Britain: and the question of how that impact changes with the level of spending. The author develops a framework for analysing spending and its impact based upon American analyses of campaign expenditures, and focusses on general election results from 1950-83. Consideration is also given to minor parties and to both local and European elections.

The secret is out and the "experts" aren't pleased. In The Keys to the White House, 1996, prominent political analyst and historian Allan J. Lichtman applies the revolutionary system with which he has analyzed every presidential election since 1860 to this year's landmark contest. While most media coverage will focus on the twists and turns of the campaign trail, The Keys to the White House, 1996 dismisses conventional campaign coverage and convincingly demonstrates why the factors that are truly relevant in electing the president have already been determined. Sure to be as controversial as it is compelling, The Keys to the White House, 1996 debunks numerous myths and sacred cows uncritically accepted by those who analyze presidential elections. Lichtman illuminates the real significance of the economy, ideology, scandal, social unrest, foreign affairs, third parties, and candidates' charisma. Furthermore, Lichtman explains why media coverage and campaign strategies - negative or positive - do not affect the outcome of presidential races.

In 2016, Donald Trump broke almost all the rules of politics to win the Republican nomination and, even more improbably, to edge out heavily favored Hillary Clinton in one of the great upsets in presidential campaign history. In Trumped: The 2016 Election That Broke All the Rules, Larry Sabato, Kyle Kondik, and Geoffrey Skelley, leading experts in American politics, bring together respected journalists, analysts, and scholars to examine every facet of the stunning 2016 election and what its improbable outcome will mean for the nation moving forward under a Trump administration. In frank, accessible prose, each author offers insight that goes beyond the headlines and dives into the underlying forces and shifts that drove the election from its earliest developments to its dramatic conclusion as one of the greatest upsets in presidential campaign history. Trumped will be an indispensable read for political junkies and all students of American politics. Contributions by Alan Abramowitz, Matt Barreto, David Byler, Anthony Cilluffo, Rhodes Cook, Robert Costa, Ariel Edwards-Levy, Natalie Jackson, Kyle Kondik, Susan MacManus, Diana Owen, Ron Rapoport, Larry Sabato, Greg Sargent, Tom Schaller, Gary Segura, Geoffrey Skelley, Walter Stone, Michael Toner, Karen Trainer, Sean Trende, and Janie Valencia

The second edition of this classic text covers contemporary democracy movements including the Arab Spring and its aftermath, Occupy, and new nations as well as old issues from the Balkans to Africa, from Latin America to Ukraine. The author has traveled widely around the world to take the pulse of transition and to profile journeys toward democracy and journeys away from democracy, too. At the same time, the book addresses important challenges that have emerged in even well-established democracies. These show up in declining voting rates, diminished membership in political parties, and, in some countries including the United States, negative views of central democratic institutions (like the US Congress).

The essays in this collection show how electoral geography has shifted from empiricist activity towards a closer involvement with the wider issues addressed by social scientists. They illustrate the potential contributions that electoral geographers can make towards the understanding of global, national and local societies.

Some of the most populated and storied American cities had mayoral elections in 2013. Open contests in New York City, Los Angeles and Boston, for example, offer laboratories to examine electoral trends in urban politics. Cities are facing varied predicaments. Boston was rocked by the bombing of the marathon on April 15. Detroit is roiled by being the largest U.S. city to declare bankruptcy, and Chicago, which had an open, competitive election in 2011, is dealing with significant gun violence. San Diego s mayor resigned in August 2013 due to sexual harassment charges and other mayors are surrounded by corruption scandals. Houston and St. Louis had non-competitive elections recently but their mayors are notable for their tenure in office and emphasis will be on public policy outcomes in those cases. Leaders in most cities face dramatic changes and challenges due to economic and social realities.

"

The Keys to City Hall" offers a complete and succinct review and analysis of the top mayoral campaigns in major American cities in recent years as well as the politics and public policy management of those urban areas. Emerging theories of urban governance, demographic changes, and economic conditions are examined in introductory chapters; the introduction will provide a unique and comprehensive focus on major trends in advertisement, changes in campaign strategies, fundraising, and the use of social media at the local level. In Part Two, scholars with expertise in local politics, urban public policy, and the governance explore some of the largest and most noteworthy U.S. cities, each of which has a recent, competitive mayoral election. They will also provide updated data on mayoral powers and problems faced by local executives.

Written as lively narratives in a highly readable style, this book advances theory on urban politics by reviewing developments in the field and aligning theoretical approaches with realities on the ground based on the most recent elections and governance structures. As such, it will be a much needed resource to scholars interested in local politics, and the public policy debates of specific major urban and metropolitan areas."

Staten Island is New York City's smallest yet fastest growing borough: a conservative, suburban community of nearly a half a million on the fringe of the nation's most liberal, global city. Staten Island: Conservative Bastion in a Liberal City chronicles how this "forgotten borough" has grappled with its uneasy relationship with the rest of the City of New York since the 1920s. Daniel C. Kramer and Richard M. Flanagan analyze the politics behind events that have shaped the borough, such as the opening of the Verrazano Bridge and the closure of the Fresh Kills Landfill. Lost opportunities are discussed, including the failure to construct a rail link to the other boroughs of New York, to adequately plan for the explosive housing boom in recent decades and, some say, to create an independent City of Staten Island. Unlike much of New York City, Staten Island is a place with robust party competition and lively democratic politics with hard-fought campaigns, bitter feuds, and career-ending scandals. Staten Island's two most successful politicians of the twentieth century-Republicans John Marchi and Guy Molinari-defended the borough's interests while defining an urban conservativism that would influence politics elsewhere. In fact, Staten Island has played a pivotal role in the winning electoral coalitions of Republican mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg and continues to spark the imaginations of New Yorkers on a scale that is disproportionate to the borough's relatively small size. Staten Island: Conservative Bastion in a Liberal City will allow readers to gain access to the borough-based roots of New York City's politics. This book will be of special interest to anyone who wishes to understand the dynamics of middle-class life and democratic representation in a global city.

Are elections out of fashion? Does it matter if voters don t show up at the polls? If yes, is legal enforcement of voting compatible with democracy? These are just a few of the questions linked to the thorny problem of electoral abstention. This book addresses the hot question whether there is a duty to vote and if this is enforceable in the form of compulsory voting.

Divided into three parts, Anthoula Malkopoulou begins by expertly presenting the importance of compulsory voting today, situating the debate within the contemporary discussion on elections, representation and democracy. In part two, she questions the historical origins of the idea in Europe. In particular, she examines parliamentary discussions and other primary sources from France, Belgium and Greece, including a few additional insights from other countries, like Switzerland, the Netherlands and Australia. Focusing especially on the years between 1870 and 1930, the reader learns about the historical actors of the debates, their efforts to legitimate punishment of abstention through normative arguments, but also their strategic motivations and political interests. While discussions at the beginning of the century focus on introducing compulsory voting, Malkopoulou criticizes its misuse and discusses the debate over its abolition after the Second World War, exposing the contingency of relevant normative claims today and the conditionality of compulsory voting.

From ancient times until today, you learn about the ideological debates, their political context and how the problems of equal representation and political accountability persist through the ages."

Recent decades have seen growing concern regarding problems of electoral integrity. The most overt malpractices used by rulers include imprisoning dissidents, harassing adversaries, coercing voters, vote-rigging counts, and even blatant disregard for the popular vote. Elsewhere minor irregularities are common, exemplified by inaccurate voter registers, maladministration of polling facilities, lack of security in absentee ballots, pro-government media bias, ballot miscounts, and gerrymandering. Serious violations of human rights that undermine electoral credibility are widely condemned by domestic observers and the international community. Recent protests about integrity have mobilized in countries as diverse as Russia, Mexico, and Egypt. However, long-standing democracies are far from immune to these ills; past problems include the notorious hanging chads in Florida in 2000 and more recent accusations of voter fraud and voter suppression during the Obama-Romney contest. When problems come to light, however, is anyone held to account and are effective remedies implemented? In response to these developments, there have been growing attempts to analyze flaws in electoral integrity and transparency using systematic data from cross-national time-series, forensic analysis, field experiments, case studies, and new instruments monitoring mass and elite perceptions of malpractices. This volume collects essays from international experts who evaluate the robustness, conceptual validity, and reliability of the growing body of evidence. The essays compare alternative approaches and apply these methods to evaluate the quality of elections in several areas, including the United States, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America. Election Watchdogs:Transparency, Accountability and Integrity presents new insights into the importance of diverse actors who promote electoral transparency, accountability, and ultimately the integrity of electoral governance.

Over the past seven decades and more, political parties have become an essential feature of the political landscape of the South Asian subcontinent, serving both as a conduit and product of the tumultuous change the region has experienced. Yet they have not been the focus of sustained scholarly attention. This collection focuses on different aspects of how major parties have been agents of - and subject to - change in three South Asian states (India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka), examining some of the apparent paradoxes of politics in the subcontinent and covering issues such as gender, religion, patronage, clientelism, political recruitment and democratic regression. Recurring themes are the importance of personalities (and the corresponding neglect of institutionalisation) and the lack of pluralism in intraparty affairs, factors that render parties and political systems vulnerable to degeneration.

This book was published as a special issue of Commonwealth and Comparative Politics.

The primary motivation for this book is to focus on something crucial that is missing in Turkish political science: well-founded theories on the Turkish voter and empiricism in scholarly research. Given the absence of such theories, one could ask what then the best model is for explaining a Turkish citizen's vote choice and political behaviour, and what schools of thought Turkish political science has. Unfortunately, it is not possible to offer a satisfactory response to either question at this point, and among the clear deficiencies in the current literature the primary one is the lack of a robust model explaining how Turkish citizens form their political attitudes, engage in political participation, or cast their votes. With these important questions in mind, this book aims to generate an interest in the theoretical and methodological tools that one can employ to conduct research contributing to the needs of the literature, particularly in political behaviour and political psychology. This book expands our understanding about the processes and the mechanisms of Turkish political behaviour, and contributes to the foundations of theory building in the literature. This book was published as a special issue of Turkish Studies.

Within an international framework, this work provides a fully comprehensive approach to the geographical coverage of elections. Numerous applications of ides and concepts from human geography are incorporated into a new political context, illustrating the manner in which electoral patterns reflect and help produce the overall geography of a region or state. Discussions of various topics are well supported by numerous maps and diagrams which help clarify arguemnts and serve to define elections within their basic geographical context.

This book delves in to the truth about the American political system and the phenomenon of religious African American women voters, offering a new theory, racializing religiosity. This theory attempts to explain the increased progressive political action of religious African American women voters in United States presidential elections from 1964 through 2008. The author presents a historical, political, and empirical analysis of the experiences of African American women voters and their ability to overcome struggles to emerge as a powerful voting bloc.

The American cultural landscape has shifted considerably since the 1990s. As church attendance has declined, seculars have increased in number and in political involvement. The economy was supposed to be the most important issue in the 2008 and 2012 elections, but social issues such as gay rights and the status of women actually had a greater impact on vote choice. Moral issues and perceptions of candidate morality had less effect on voters in 2004 than in 2008. These arguments directly challenge the conventional wisdom concerning the 2004 and 2008 elections, which were supposedly decided on the basis of moral values and the economy respectively. Yet in The Politics of Sex, Susan B. Hansen justifies these claims theoretically based on evidence about how voters actually evaluate candidates. Hansen explores trends in public opinion on abortion, gay rights, and the status of women and finds that "values voters" are still crucial in presidential elections, even those supposedly fought over economic or foreign-policy issues. She then analyzes campaign strategies and vote choice to show how Barack Obama made effective use of the liberal trends in public opinion on social issues in 2008 and 2012. Hansen also examines trends in demographics, religious involvement, the institutional setting, and public opinion to predict who in future years benefit from the politics of sex. By providing an historical perspective on the changing impact of morality politics on presidential elections, this book will show how and why the politics of sex now favors the Democratic Party.

A History of British Elections since 1689 represents a unique single-volume authoritative reference guide to British elections and electoral systems from the Glorious Revolution to the present day. The main focus is on general elections and associated by-elections, but Chris Cook and John Stevenson also cover national referenda, European parliament elections, municipal elections, and elections to the Welsh and Northern Irish assemblies and the Scottish parliament. The outcome and political significance of all these elections are looked at in detail, but the authors also discuss broader themes and debates in British electoral history, for example: the evolution of the electoral system, parliamentary reform, women's suffrage, constituency size and numbers, elimination of corrupt practices, and other important topics. The book also follows the fortunes not only of the major political parties but of fringe movements of the extreme right and left. Combining data, summary and analysis with thematic overviews and chronological outlines, this major new reference provides a definitive guide to the long and varied history of British elections and is essential reading for students of British political history.

Electronic Democracy analyses the impact of new information and communication technologies (ICTs) within representative democracy, such as political parties, pressure groups, new social movements and executive and legislative bodies. Arguing for the validity of social perspective in theory building, it examines how representative democracies are adapting to new ICTs. It features a number of comparative studies focusing on the UK, the US, Sweden, Germany, Korea and Australia.