Winning Elections Faucheux Pdf Download
Elena Piersanti
Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal was elected twice without runoffs. In 2007, his first winning gubernatorial race, turnout was 47%. In 2011, his reelection race against weak opposition, turnout dropped to 37%.
The political climate in the U.S. seems to be reaching a boiling point. Currently, a lot of press and 'water cooler' talk revolves around the thinking 'throw the bums out', but voters never seem to do that. Many books and studies have been done that show that incumbents win an overwhelming amount of the time. Some of the research presented will discuss win rates and areas that might increase the odds for challengers. This includes the principals of strategy called MOOSEMUSS. The peer reviewed research and advice from experts leads to defining six strategy types. This leads to identification of four areas of research that point to things a challenger can use to win, including who is more likely to beat an incumbent. Reasons exist to face an incumbent shown in a study of the 1970-1984 elections that the lower your office the more likely you will defeat an incumbent (Green & Krasno, 1990). In addition, the reseach shows some ways that a challenger can increase their chances of success. Winning an election as a challenger can be achieved if a person can understand what strategy is, what strategy the campaign should use and by using the right tactics.
Same day voter registration can increase voter turnout on election day. Voters in the middle of the socioeconomic spectrum turn out five percent (5%) higher in areas with election day voter registration rules than areas with 30-day advanced registration. This is marginally higher than the low and high socioeconomic spectrum (Brians & Grofman, 2001). Any group turning out in higher percentages on election day can be used as an advantage. With the voters being evenly divided in partisan elections, the timing of strategy could be used as an advantage by suppressing or increasing the number of registered voters. In many cases, voters are presented with positions and statements from candidates that deepen cynicism and discourage participation. With the elections being decided at the fifty percent (50%) mark, marginal voters matter (Schmitt, 2002). The opportunity as a challenger is to use voter registration in your strategy. Same day or advanced registration will present different strategy and tactic options.
In conclusion, winning as a challenger against an incumbent is possible. Being a woman, and running on women's issues, increases the win probability by eleven percent (11%) (Herrnson, Lay & Stokes, 2003). Knowing the voter registration closing date increases or decreases turnout for certain members of socioeconomic spectrum should be incorporated into strategy planning process (Brians & Grofman, 2001). Maintaining undecided voters' awareness of the challenger will help in getting them to break for the challenger. If you have not held office before don't worry many successful challengers have won. Just be prepared sometimes you have to run against them more than once. From the research hope for the challenger lies in developing an understanding of strategy, planning the campaign strategy and using a variety of tactics to overcome incumbent advantages to win.
"I see it a little differently," he told CNN's Judy Woodruff in 2003. "We won three out of those four elections, we picked up seats in the House. I'm proud of that. I'm proud of the leadership. ... I learned a lot from all of that experience."
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