Research Seed Grant | 1999-2000
Campaign Dynamics
by Robert Erikson (Political Science)
What predicts elections? What effects do campaign events have on election outcomes? Do campaigns matter? These are some important if ill-defined questions involving campaigns and election outcomes. "The campaign" has been an increasingly important focus of political science discussions of elections. Yet questions of the type indicated above are still being defined and not yet definitively answered. If there is a conventional wisdom among political scientists today who study the matter, it is this: Elections are easily predictable from variables such as economic conditions and the popularity of the current president (whether or not he can or does try to succeed himself). Therefore, what candidates do during the course of the campaign is largely irrelevant to their fate. Candidates do try to run the best campaigns they can. But this only cancels out their equal and opposite effects. Election outcomes are automatic. This caricature is simplistic, but is based on certain truths. Election results are at least as predictable from economic and political conditions on the eve of the election as they are from election eve polls. And polls typically reveal little relevant movement over the fall campaign—from Labor Day to Election Day—when campaigning is full-blown. This research focuses on two key issues: how collective choices converge toward the election day verdict, and what is the role of observable election indicators as guiding the voters' collective choice.
See Also
- Research grant: Election Campaigns and the Voter
