THE PARADOX At one point during the 1988 campaign, Michael Dukakis was ahead in the public opinion polls by 17 percentage points, but he eventually lost the election by 8 percent. Walter Mondale was ahead in the polls by 4 percent during the 1984 campaign but lost the election in a landslide. During June and July of 1992, Clinton, Bush, and Perot each had turns in the public opinion poll lead. ...

This study reports on incorporation of the Web during the 2004 European Parliament election as played out in 11 EU Member States. Based on an analysis of Web site features related to a conceptualization of political engagement, the study examines utilization of features reflecting information provision and opportunities for discussion and political action. The findings reflect the low level of ...

1 It is something of an understatement to say that most Americans pay little attention to the world of politics. Survey after survey has shown that Americans are often at a loss to relate basic facts about the players, issues, and rules of the game that structure American political life (Delli Carpini & Keeter, 1996). For instance, when asked whether the Republican or Democratic party was gener...

The 2004 election has been interpreted as a resounding victory for conservative values. Was it in fact a mandate? The present analysis examines recent electoral outcomes and the 2004 election with particular reference to economic and political fundamentals. It compares the results of the 2004 election with predictions using voting models. Additionally, it identifies the trends for different soc...

The 2004 election has been interpreted as a resounding victory for conservative values. Was it in fact a mandate? The present analysis examines recent electoral outcomes and the 2004 election with particular reference to economic and political fundamentals. It compares the results of the 2004 election with predictions using voting models. Additionally, it identifies the trends for different soc...

The paper studies political competition between endogenously formed parties. For this purpose, it develops a theoretical model in which party formation allows like-minded citizens to coordinate their political behavior in two ways. First, they can share the cost of running in a public election. Second, they can select a candidate for this election from their ranks, thereby committing to a polic...

Budget forecasts are used by incumbent governments as a political tool to manage the elector particularly during an election cycle (Bruck and Stephan 2006). Incumbents apply budget forecasts strategically. They use short-term forecasts, which are more likely to be unbiased by political factors, annually. They rely on long-term forecasts, which are likely to be biased by political calculations, ...

This paper uses an unusual administrative dataset covering the universe of French hospitals to consider hospital employment: this is consistently higher in public hospitals than in not-for-profit (NFP) or private hospitals, even controlling for a number of measures of hospital output. NFP hospitals serve as a benchmark, being very similar to public hospitals, but without political influence on ...

Electoral systems are uniquely distributive political institutions that shape political outcomes, yet are themselves endogenously shaped outcomes of political choices. In Poland, party system development has involved not only parties adapting to electoral institutions in each election, but also parties modifying these institutions prior to every election. We model electoral system change as dri...