Candidates In Primary Elections Research Articles

Why aren’t more women on the gubernatorial ballot?

ABSTRACT Although women now occupy a record number of governorships and the number of women running for governor has increased significantly in the last four years, women still run for governor at lower rates than men. This study examines why there have been so few women gubernatorial candidates in primary elections using a dataset that includes every primary election or convention used to select major party gubernatorial nominees from 1978 through 2022. We examine four distinct areas to learn why so few women run: the potential candidate pool; candidates, parties, and voters as strategic actors; gubernatorial office structure; and major political, social, and cultural events and their impact on candidate pools. With some important differences between the Democratic and Republican parties, we find that each of these areas has a significant impact on whether women run for governor. Notably, we find that the pipeline is significant for Republican women during the period of study but not for Democratic women. Office structure, incumbent governors, and events such as those surrounding the 2016 election, also impact whether women run for governor. The results indicate that states can adopt changes to the structure of the governor’s office, and parties can adopt rules and facilitate norms that are favorable to women.

No Experience Required: Early Donations and Amateur Candidate Success in Primary Elections

The electoral dominance of “quality” candidates—political insiders with a history of holding office—is well‐established. However, research on the recent rise in successful political neophytes is less studied. Despite longstanding trends in the predominance of experienced candidates in primary elections, nearly half of all quality candidates who ran in non‐incumbent races lost to a candidate without prior electoral experience in 2018. In this article, we investigate the success of political newcomers in elections for the U.S. House of Representatives by examining a topic often overlooked in the growing literature on primaries: campaign finance. We show that, from 2016 to 2020, political newcomers saw (1) greater success in future fundraising, and (2) an increased likelihood of primary election victory when they garnered more early contributions from outside their district. This contrasts with prior elections, where early money from inside a candidate's own congressional district served as the strongest predictor of future fundraising and electoral success.

Do Ideological Attacks Change How Voters Evaluate Primary Election Candidates?

Partisan polarization in the United States has increased the ideological uniformity of the Democratic and Republican parties, and therefore the usefulness of party identification as an indicator of candidates’ ideology. However, candidates – especially during primary elections – often attack their opponents for being insufficiently conservative or progressive, explicitly signaling to voters that they should put less faith in their stereotypes about the party’s ideology when evaluating candidates. To assess the effects of these ideological attacks, we conduct a Dynamic Process Tracing Environment experiment that simulates a primary election campaign. We find mixed evidence that participants, when exposed to an ideological attack ad, lower their ratings of the attacked candidate’s ideological extremity, overall favorability, qualification for office, and trustworthiness. However, we observe no differences between experimental conditions in terms of information search, suggesting that ideological attacks are generally accepted at face value and not independently verified by voters.

In Party We Trust? Voter Support for Party-Backed Candidates in Primary Elections

When parties decide, do voters listen? We argue that the answer depends on voters’ trust in the institutions of American politics. Using both a conjoint experiment and a traditional survey experiment with subjects voting in hypothetical congressional primary elections, we find that respondents from both parties are more likely to support a candidate when that candidate is endorsed by a member of the party or when the candidate has previously served in elected office. However, these findings are conditional on trust and partisanship. For Democrats, we find that support for party-backed candidates erodes among low-trust respondents. Low-trust Democrats are particularly resistant to candidates endorsed by traditional party elites such as Speaker Pelosi, President Obama, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and are less likely to support experienced candidates. While low-trust Republicans are more skeptical of endorsements from traditional party actors like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, the most salient attribute for Republicans is an endorsement from President Trump, which significantly boosted support in both studies independent of trust. Our findings support party-centric theories of primaries but suggest that voter distrust in the political system threatens parties’ control over their nominations.

Signaling valence in primary elections

This paper presents a model of two-stage (primary and general) elections in which primary election candidates differ in terms of a privately observed quality dimension (valence). I show that primary election candidates have the incentive to signal their valence by means of their policy platform choice. There can be two types of separating equilibria in primary elections, with opposite implications concerning the relationship between valence and policy extremism. In an extremist equilibrium valent candidates choose more extreme policies than non-valent ones, whereas in a centrist equilibrium valent candidates move close to the incumbent from the opposing party. As a result, primary elections can foster the adoption of extremist policies, but they can also have the opposite effect. This result allows the model to also shed light on the circumstances in which party voters are likely to benefit from the introduction of primary elections.

Party crashers: Interest groups as a latent threat to party networks in congressional primaries

Recent research asserts that coalitions of party leaders, interest groups, and activists will cooperate to support the nomination of mutually acceptable candidates in primary elections. In this article, I utilize an original data set containing FEC contributions and expenditures data for 1648 candidates who ran in open seat primary elections for the US House from 2006 to 2016 to measure the extent and effects of coordination among interest groups and party organizations. I find that Democratic-aligned interest groups and party leaders coordinate more often and with a more positive substantive effect than their Republican counterparts. Moreover, I provide evidence that, with the advent of super PACs in the second half of the 2010 primary cycle, a small number of interest groups can act as a latent threat to broader coalitions that unite behind a candidate using independent expenditures to outspend the broader coalitions. This increased resource parity has tangible representational consequences.

Candidate competition and voter learning in the 2000–2012 US presidential primaries

When candidates in primary elections are ideologically differentiated (e.g., conservatives and moderates in the Republican Party), then candidates with similar positions affect each others’ vote shares more strongly than candidates with different ideological positions. We measure this effect in US presidential primaries and show that it is of first-order importance. We also show that voters’ beliefs about the candidates harden over the course of the primary, as manifested in the variability of candidate vote shares. We discuss models of sequential voting that cannot yield that pattern of results, and propose an explanation based on a model with horizontally and vertically differentiated candidates and incompletely informed voters. Consistent with the predictions of this model, we also show that, in more conservative states, low-quality conservative candidates do better relative to high-quality conservatives, and vice versa.

Candidate Competition and Voter Learning in the 2000-2012 US Presidential Primaries

When candidates in primary elections are ideologically differentiated (e.g., conservatives and moderates in the Republican party), then candidates with similar positions affect each others' vote shares more strongly than candidates with different ideological positions. We measure this effect in U.S. Presidential primaries and show that it is of first order importance. We also show that voter beliefs about the candidates harden over the course of the primary, as manifested in the variability of candidate vote shares. We discuss models of sequential voting that cannot yield this pattern of results, and propose an explanation based on a model with horizontally and vertically differentiated candidates and incompletely informed voters. Consistent with the predictions of this model, we also show that, in more conservative states, low quality conservative candidates do better relative to high quality conservatives, and vice versa.

The regional primary elections in Italy: a general overview

ABSTRACTPrimary elections are frequently used by Italian parties, particularly those of the centre-left. Primaries are used not only at the local and national levels, but also at the regional level. Until 2013, primary elections had been held in a limited number of regions where there were presidential and legislative-assembly elections. The 2014–15 period, however, has seen an explosion in the use of primaries with eight taking place in a few months, almost as many as in the previous 8 years. To these should be added the closed and online primaries of the Five Star Movement. These, given their characteristics, can hardly be compared with the primaries of the centre-left. This article will look at the 17 regional primaries organised by the Italian centre–left parties. We analyse the level of participation of the selectors, the results and the level of competitiveness. Finally, particular attention will be paid to the performances of the primary-election candidates and those of the selected candidates in the subsequent elections. This will help us to understand whether the primaries affected the outcome of the regional elections.

Primaries and Candidates: Examining the Influence of Primary Electorates on Candidate Ideology

Primary elections in the United States have been under-studied in the political science literature. Using new data to estimate the ideal points of primary election candidates and constituents, we examine the link between the ideological leanings of primary electorates and the ideological orientation of US congressional candidates. We use district-level data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study and ideal point estimates for congressional primary election candidates to examine the role of primary electorate ideology in the selection of party nominees. We find that more extreme Republicans are more likely to win their party’s primary and that Republican and Democratic candidates are responsive to different electoral constituencies.

Primaries and Candidates: Examining the Influence of Primary Electorates on Candidate Ideology

Primary elections in the United States have been under-studied in the political science literature. Using new data to estimate the ideal points of primary election candidates and constituents, we examine the link between the ideological leanings of primary electorates and the ideological orientation of U.S. congressional candidates. We use district-level data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study and ideal point estimates for congressional primary election candidates to examine the role of primary electorate ideology in the selection of party nominees. We find that more extreme Republicans are more likely to win their party's primary and that Republican and Democratic candidates are responsive to different electoral constituencies.

Polarized Primaries and Polarized Legislators: Examining the Influence of Primary Elections on Polarization in the U.S. House

In this article we develop and test an electoral connection theory of congressional polarization. We theorize that ideologically extreme primary voters are one of the driving forces behind electoral polarization, and polarization among primary voters is reflected in the polarization of party nominees for the House of Representatives. We use district-level data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study and ideal point estimates for congressional primary election candidates to examine the role of primary electorate ideology in the selection of party nominees. We find that primary voters are more extreme than general election voters, and candidates who run in primary elections with more polarized electorates are likewise more polarized. We also find a significant interaction between extreme primary electorates selecting extreme primary candidates. Finally, we find that Republican and Democratic candidates respond to different electoral constituencies.

Party Coalitions and Interest Group Networks

We analyze affiliation networks of interest groups that endorse the same candidates in primary elections, donate to the same candidates in general elections, and voice support for the same legislative proposals. Patterns of interest group ties resemble two competing party coalitions in elections but not in legislative debate. Campaign endorsement and financial contribution ties among interest groups are consistently correlated but legislative ties do not follow directly from electoral alliances. The results challenge the consensus in the emerging literature on the expanded party organization; interest groups have distinct incentives to join together in a party coalition in elections but also to build bipartisan grand coalitions to pursue legislative goals. We also modify conventional views on party differences. The Democratic coalition is not fractured into many small constituencies. The Democratic campaign and legislative networks are denser than equivalent Republican networks, with a core of labor organizations occupying central positions.

Cross-Filing and the Progressive Movement in California Politics

MAY 5, 1959, Governor Edmund G. Brown of California signed into law a measure abolishing state's controversial system of cross-filing, a unique provision in primary election code which permitted a candidate to seek nomination of more than one political party. The repeal of cross-filing marked close of a forty-six year era in California politics during which dual nominations were common and party responsibility reached a low ebb. Yet, it is important to note that cross-filing was originally adopted as a temporary reform measure, and it was not intended to be a final solution to problem of selecting candidates in primary elections. It became law during Progressive era, a period of insurgency in state and national politics, and is best understood by examining evolution of various primary laws which appeared between 1909 and 1919. The first decade of twentieth century witnessed a number of events which were to ignite Progressive movement and drastically alter future of partisan politics in California. Nationally, Presidency of Theodore Roosevelt provided inspiration and leadership for reform. Locally, revelations of bribery and corruption under Mayor Eugene Schmitz and boss Abraham Ruef in San Francisco, and continuing domination of state politics by Southern Pacific Railroad dramatized need for reform in California. The founding of Lincoln Roosevelt League in 1907 inaugurated reform movement, and new organization pledged itself to the emancipation of Republican party in California from domination by... Southern Pacific Railroad Company and allied interests. Meanwhile, under pressure, state bosses permitted legislature to propose a constitutional amendment providing for a direct primary, and change was overwhelmingly approved by voters in general election of 1908. For many reformers, passage of this amendment became opening wedge in their battle for control of Republican party in California. The 1909 legislature passed first California direct primary act. Most of reformers, however, were critical of partisan requirements of new law, for, as Franklin Hichborn, foremost political reporter of period observed: Throughout measure made it smooth sailing for mere partisan and extremely hard for independent Republican or independent Democrat to secure party nomination. x In order to be a candi-