POL_S 317 Lecture Notes - Lecture 27: Nonpartisanism, Geotargeting, Unintended Consequences
Document Summary
Campaigns matter less when there is no real competition. Most elections (except for the presidential) are not competitive. Normative concerns: competitive elections are crucial for democracy. State and local leaders are the closest to the people. But the people are least familiar with them. State and local elections are 96% of all elections. Yet, probably we pay 96% of our attention to the 4% Lack of competitiveness and little media attention. Lack of competitiveness and little media attention: the representatives might be less responsive to what the people would want. They don"t need to worry about re-election. That doesn"t mean that elected will do terrible jobs: but, democracy is not about the good performance or outcomes. In fact, many authoritarian leaders have emphasized outcomes: democracy is about the process, the political process at state/local levels seems to be less democratic. Early reform to make local eelectios more meaningful: off cycle elections, non-partisan elections. Consequences: little competition, uninformed electorate (cid:1) (cid:1)
