U.s. Political Parties And Electoral Politics (1976-2000)

Hypothesis: In contemporary U.S. elections, both presidential and congressional, political parties still play an important role despite the very changes of electoral rales and candidate-centered and media-oriented campaigns.Method: Empirical Analysis and Survey Data Analysis.Theory: American political parties consist of three parts, party organizations, party-in-the-electorate and party-in-the-Government. Different part influences different elections in different ways, but parties are still relevant to the candidates as well as to the voters. Among party organizations, national parties are the backbones in raising and spending monies for promoting their candidates indirectly and coordinating across the nation. As to the Party-in-the-Electorate, party identification plays a central role in the electorate's voting choice. Party-in-the-government has great impacts on elections by the candidates' incumbency.Findings: Contrary to the general impression of the encompassing withering of the party organizations, the national parties are stronger than it was whereas the state and local organizations are more dependent on the national party organizations in financial spending for the candidates. The parties declines in the following aspects: in nominating its candidates (because of widespread direct primary and political journalism), in donating direct money for its candidates (because of public financing in presidential elections and the rise of the PACs in the congressional elections) and in campaign strategy and tactics (because of the use of the high-tech in the campaign and the rise of the professional political consultants). The party organizations are important in political ads, in offering the campaign services and GOTV (go-outvoting) movement for the candidates. We also find that party identification as a predisposition still influences the voter's choice through the evaluation of the personality, issue stands and job performance of candidates. The percentage of party affiliates does not reduce too much if we distinguish the "closet" party affiliates of the independent voters who incline either of the parties from the pure independent voters. Finally the incumbent candidates generally have great advantages over challengers in terms of finance, name recognition, free advertising and publicity, particularly obvious in House elections.