Presidential Elections

This classic text argues that the institutional rules of the presidential election process, in combination with the behavior of the mass electorate, structure the strategic choices faced by politicians. Thoroughly revised and updated, this 16^th edition provides everything students need to know about presidential elections going into the 2024 cycle.

Polsby and Wildavsky’s classic text, now updated by Stephen Schier and David Hopkins, argues that the institutional rules of the presidential nomination and election processes, in combination with the behavior of the mass electorate, structure the strategic choices faced by politicians in powerful and foreseeable ways. We can make sense of the decisions made by different political actors—incumbents, challengers, Democrats, Republicans, consultants, party officials, activists, delegates, journalists, and voters—by understanding the ways in which their world is organized by incentives, regulations, events, resources, customs, and opportunities. Thoroughly revised and updated, this Sixteenth Edition provides everything students need to know about presidential elections going into the 2024 cycle.

List of Figures, Tables, and Boxes

Preface

PART I. THE STRATEGIC ENVIRONMENT
1. VOTERS
Why People Don’t Vote
Why People Do Vote: A Theory of Social Connectedness
Party Identification as Social Identity
Parties as Aggregates of Loyal Voters
Ideologies, Issues, and National Conditions in the Minds of Voters
Changes in Party Identification: Social Habit versus Contemporary Evaluation
A Central Strategic Problem: The Attentiveness of Voters

2. GROUPS
The Presidential Vote as an Aggregation of Interest Groups
Variations among Interest Groups
“Special” Interests, Campaign Spending, and Public Interest Groups
Political Parties as Organizations
Third Parties

3. RULES AND RESOURCES
Rules: The Electoral College
Thinking About Resources
Resources: Money
Resources: Control over Information
Incumbency as a Resource: The Presidency
Incumbency as a Liability: The Vice Presidency
The Balance of Resources

PART II. SEQUENCES
4. THE NOMINATION PROCESS
Before the Voting Begins: The “Invisible Primary”
The Early States

What Do These Historical Vignettes Teach?
Super Tuesday and Later Primaries
State and Territorial Caucuses
Delegate Allocation
Superdelegates

An Ever-Changing Nomination Process
The National Party Conventions

The Convention as Advertising
The Vice Presidential Nominee
The Future of National Conventions

5. THE CAMPAIGN
The Well-Traveled Candidates
Persuading Voters
Winning the Media Game
Campaign Professionals
Televised Debates
Getting Out the Vote
Campaign Blunders
Forecasting the Outcome
Counting the Vote

PART III. ISSUES
6. APPRAISALS
Reform upon Reform
The Political Theory of Policy Government
Reform by Means of Participatory Democracy
Some Specific Reforms
Party Platforms and Party Differences

7. AMERICAN PARTIES AND DEMOCRACY
Elections and Public Policy
Parties of Advocacy versus Parties of Intermediation

APPENDIXES
A. Vote by Groups in Presidential Elections, 1984–2020
B. Voter Turnout in Presidential Elections, by Population Characteristics, 1984–2020
C. Selections from the Democratic and Republican Party Platforms, 2020

Notes

Index