Contentious Elections Research Articles

Werkbundpolitik and Weltpolitik: The German State's Interest in Global Commerce and "Good Design," 1912-1914"

Although the conflict between Muthesius and van de Velde has been well documented in the annals of modern architectural and design history, far less understood is the extent to which domestic political crises and new policy departures in Berlin served as preconditions for the Werkbund conflict in the first place. Prominent Werkbund members—men such as Werkbund Managing Director Ernst Jäckh and Werkbund Vice President Hermann Muthesius, but also including such national political figures and Werkbund members as Friedrich Naumann of Württemberg and Gustav Stresemann of Saxony—used institutional affiliations and their multiple professional identities to forge unprecedented linkages between the Werkbund leadership, industrial interest groups, and powerful German state interests. Specifically, and at the national level, new policies articulated by German Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg and key German ministries in Berlin, strident national interest group politics, and an evolving state outlook toward Weltpolitik (geopolitical strategy) combined to reshape Werkbund policy in fundamental ways between 1912 and 1914. Without these forces, and without developments that followed the lopsided and highly contentious Reichstag elections of January 1912, the Werkbund likely never would have risen to the prominent position it came to occupy with state authorities by July 1914.

What's Wrong and What Should Be Done?: Comments on the Case Study

This is an excellent case study that frames the essential conflicts or cross-cutting pressures of politics, planning, and professionalism that typically face economic development professionals. If any readers are inclined to assume that the case presents a nightmare version of a worst-case scenario, they should realize that such situations are very likely the norm. And, although it may initially appear that the case is about conflicting values, it also represents the intersection of politics, planning, and professionalism and highlights how these three streams or forces might come together. The political pressures faced by Jim in Dempsey are common: the need for past and future electoral support from the business community; the presence of a ward city council structure leading to geographically based representation of interests and a clear blame structure; upcoming, likely contentious elections; different constituent groups with differing and often competing goals; conflict within groups about goals; and few economic development resources to allocate. It's a classic political quagmire. And, the group divisions present a mirror of some of the most contentious cleavages that separate members of a community: racial and ethnic divisions, local business owners versus absentee owners, merchants from different commercial districts and wards, new versus long-term residents, and commuters versus residents. Yet, the professional imperatives are also very strong. Jim is very aware that he must come up with a method to best distribute scarce resources, determine whose definition of best is the most cost-effective way to proceed, and balance short-term distributive goals with long-term capacity building. At this point, it is easy to identify what Jim should have done. Obviously, a strategic planning exercise very early in his tenure, bringing all stakeholders together to verbalize and understand their differing goals, would have helped to identify areas where compromises might have been possible and would have increased the sense among stakeholders that they had input into the process. However, at this point in time, it is too late for that. Jim needs a solution quickly, and he would not likely appreciate this particular bit of hindsight.

Would the Borda Count Have Avoided the Civil War?

The election of 1860 was one of the most important and contentious elections in US history. It was also one of the most interesting. Four candidates from three different parties battled for the presidency and all four received a significant number of votes. We ask whether Lincoln's victory was sound, or was it due to a fluke in the electoral system? Did a Lincoln win plausibly represent the will of the voters or would a different voting system have represented their preferences more accurately? Would the outcome have been the same had one or more of the candidates dropped out of the race? These and other questions are answered using new graphical techniques which let us assess voter preferences more accurately. Using these techniques, we are able to show, in a single figure, the outcome of every positional voting system, as well as all possible approval voting outcomes. By comparing the outcome under plurality rule to the outcomes which would have occurred under other voting systems, we conclude that Stephen Douglas, not Lincoln, was plausibly the candidate who best represented the preferences of the voters.