The Study of Campaign Consultants: A Subfield in Search of Theory

Abstract

The central theme of thisPSsymposium is that political consultants are important in politics, that they have an impact on campaigns and elections. This is not news to political consultants or candidates running for office. Candidates and consultants know they need each other and the rapid growth and diversification of the profession reveals that sense of interdependence (see Thurber 1995). Though professional political consulting outside of political party organizations has been around since the 1930s, it has only recently sparked interest among political scientists. Why have consultants been ignored by political scientists? Why have consultants ignored political scientists (see Thurber and Nelson 1995)? Why is there little or no theory related to political consultants? Why do we know so little about the profession of political consultants? What subfield houses the study of political consulting: elections and voting behavior, political parties, political communications, political advertising, campaign management?Political scientists have studied campaigns, elections, and political parties from a variety of views and methodologies, but few have focused on political consultants and their influence. Political campaigns are efforts to win elections to public office by informing the voters of a candidate's issue positions, by persuading the electorate to vote for a candidate, by activating partisans, and by mobilizing supporters. Election campaigns are combats over ideas and ways to persuade groups of voters to support those ideas. Studies have treated campaigns as symbolic events, as propaganda activities with the power to change voter preferences, and as a determinant variable in elections, but there is little consensus among political scientists about the role consultants play in campaigns.