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What is the relationship, if any, between electoral systems and the internal organization of legislatures? Existing research on the United States’ Congress suggests that the single member plurality electoral system, and the incentive to cultivate a personal vote which it creates, explains the emergence of strong committees as the most significant organizational feature of that legislature. Exploring the issue from a comparative perspective, I argue that the relationship between ballot structure and committee system structure is dependent on how legislators cultivate personal votes. I show why committees will be stronger when legislators cultivate personal votes by supplying fiscal legislative particularism but weaker when legislators cultivate personal votes by delivering extra-legislative constituency service. I test and find evidence for this proposition using data on ballot structure, mechanism to cultivate a personal vote (MCPV) and committee design in 39 democratic legislatures. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The French National Front constitutes the emblematic example of a successful minor party with a highly malleable, radical ideology, in a system with in-built majoritarian tendencies. This paper examines the sources of the FN’s electoral support, given the structure of French political institutions. The FN is frequently characterised as a “far right” party, yet studies suggest that a substantial proportion of its support comes from those whose political preferences lean towards the left, and even the far left. The two-round system used in France provides an opportunity to investigate this using electoral data. The voters who cast the ballot for third party candidates in the first round are typically forced to choose between a leftist and a rightist candidate in the second round. This process constitutes an intertemporal ticket splitting mechanism where the voter splits her ballots between the most preferred party in the first round and the party representing her personal left-right orientation in the second. We use a simplified version of multilevel techniques for ecological inference to examine the pattern of ticket-splitting by Le Pen’s voters in the first round of the most recent Presidential election. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Surveys of the American electorate have repeatedly demonstrated pervasive low levels of political knowledge, though political psychology has countered the importance of this, demonstrating that voters are able to use cognitive heuristics to approximate well-informed decisions using relatively low levels of information. However, the vast majority of studies of voting heuristics examine the vote choice in isolation, looking only at a single vote decision at a time and typically looking at top-of-the ballot races, such as the Presidency. The reality of the American electoral system is far more complicated, requiring voters to learn about multiple contests simultaneously, some of them of lower status, limiting the attention they are willing or able to devote to any single contest or set of candidates. Even using heuristics, voters must possess a bare minimum of information, and as the number of contests increases the amount voters can be expected to learn and retain about any single contest should decline, at some point reaching an absolute minimal level. Using existing surveys of political knowledge, I examine the impact that multiple Federal offices on the ballot have upon voter’s knowledge of the candidates for those offices. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars have long been interested in the secondary effects associated with direct democracy, most notably a possible positive effect on turnout. Over the past few elections, politicians and media pundits have come to share this interest, especially with regards to social issue ballot measures, such as those relating to same-sex marriage or abortion. Empirical evidence for whether such a relationship exists is mixed, which can be attributed to a theoretical ambiguity about the best way to measure the direct democracy process. Previous measures of the process have both largely neglected the importance of awareness and focused exclusively on initiatives, capturing only a portion of the legislating process available to voters at the polls. This paper addresses these theoretical deficiencies. Employing the Current Population Survey November Voting and Registration Supplement from the past five elections, a unique data set which identifies the issue content of ballot measures, and hierarchical generalized linear modeling to account for the multilevel nature of the data, I find that the number of social issue measures present on the ballot had a positive impact on turnout during the past three midterm elections and one of the past two presidential elections. In contrast, I find that the total number of propositions on the ballot is only rarely associated with an increase in turnout. I discuss the implications of these findings in the conclusion. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We empirically document the contextual effects of ballot position on voter choice. In particular, for a given race, we find that voters who observe the race relatively further down the ballot are more likely to undervote and vote -no'. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the determinants of support for seven anti-gay marriage constitutional amendments approved by state voters in 2006. The urban/rural nature of counties, as well as political and demographic characteristics, are examined. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the language used in the public debate over same-sex marriage in states that put same-sex marriage bans on the ballot in 2006 to measure the level of rights consciousness among movement activists on both sides of the question. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the effects of the office-bloc and party column ballot formats on congressional elections. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines whether controversial ballot initiatives lead to higher voter turnout when such initiatives are on the ballot. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper looks at the impact of changing voting technology on intended and unintended consequences measured through different forms of voting behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study will show that the elimination of the straight ticket voting option is likely to affect weak partisans the most, as they will become more likely to engage in down-ballot abstention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2004 San Francisco will use alternative voting. Concerns about voters understanding the new ballot are examined through an exit poll and mail-in survey of absentee voters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the shadows of the recent gubernatorial recall election, California voters also deliberated a controversial ballot measure that would have banned the state from collecting most race and ethnicity data about its residents. As recently as four months before the election, polls suggested Proposition 54 was favored by more than a 20 point margin among likely voters. Like earlier controversial ballot initiatives that barred services to certain immigrants, outlawed public affirmative action programs, and eliminated bilingual education in public schools, Proposition 54 and its sponsor, Ward Connerly, seemed poised to realign the racial politics of the state once again. As the initiative won the endorsement of the state Republican Party and leading conservative commentators across the nation, civil rights groups scrambled to devise an opposition strategy that might prevent another ignominious defeat. But as public and media interest in the gubernatorial recall campaign ignited, polls showed support for Proposition 54 dropped precipitously. On Election Day, the initiative was defeated by nearly 30 points and exit polls indicated that nearly every major demographic and geographic subgroup, save conservative Republicans, opposed the measure by large margins. How can we account for this dramatic reversal in the fortunes of Proposition 54? Does its overwhelming rejection by the electorate signal a more inclusive, and less polarized approach towards racialized politics in the state? Is Connerly likely to bring his call for a ‘colorblind’ government back to voters in the future? This paper examines the findings of nearly a dozen polls, several focus groups, interviews with leading figures in the campaigns, and two years of media coverage around the initiative to answer these questions. In addition, I draw on theories of issue framing to understand how different segments of the electorate interpreted the meaning of Proposition 54 and its potential impact. I conclude with a discussion of future possibilities and trajectories for political discourse about race in the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While several recent studies have shown that the presence of salient ballot questions increases voter turnout, we know very little about the nature of that increased turnout. Specifically, we are interested to know what effect this increased turnout resulting from salient ballot questions has on candidate campaigns elsewhere on the ballot, and if so, whether these effects systematically help candidates from one of the major parties. We construct several alternative hypotheses with respect to the relationship between initiative campaigns and candidate campaigns, and we undertake a first attempt to assess their validity. We find some initial evidence consistent with the conclusion that Republican candidates have benefited disproportionately from the presence of salient ballot initiatives in the few cases we study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Split ticket voting has long been of interest to students of voting behavior. Understanding these voters is particularly challenging because they appear to be ideologically inconsistent and to be casting their votes based on a variety of other factors. The study of split ticket voting, to date, has focused on candidate elections. However, ballot issues also allow voters to make ideologically inconsistent choices that could be described as split ticket voting. Understanding split ticket ballot issue voting is useful in several ways. First, a significant body of research has developed around ballot issues and this research will add to that literature. Second, this research adds another piece to the puzzle of ideologically inconsistent voters. Third, there is a growing profession among campaign consults who focus on ballot issue campaigns. This research will add to their knowledge of how voters react when multiple issues are on the ballot. To better understand the dynamics of split ticket voting on ballot issues this research uses a unique methodology (one that may no longer be available once electronic voting becomes the norm). It examines actual ballots of voters to identify split ticket voting. These data were combined with probability voting models to examine the variation is split ticket ballot issue voting in three communities. The research will compare an ideological model with an information processing model to determine which provides the better fit. Data for this project have been collected and the analysis is underway. The results should provide a clearer picture of issue election voting and suggest implications for candidate based split ticket theories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We analyze a natural experiment to answer the longstanding question of whether the name order of candidates on ballots affects election outcomes. Since 1975, California law has mandated randomizing the ballot order with a lottery, where alphabet letters would be ?shaken vigorously? and selected from a container. Previous studies, relying overwhelmingly on non-randomized data, have yielded conflicting results about whether ballot order effects even exist. Using improved statistical methods, our analysis of statewide elections from 1978 to 2002 reveals that ballot order might have changed the winner in twelve percent of all primary races, including major and minor party races. Effects in general elections remain large for minor party and nonpartisan candidates, but not major party candidates. We propose that all electoral jurisdictions randomize ballot order to minimize ballot effects, and we show that randomization may be substantially more cost-effective at reducing voting bias than currently proposed voting technology reforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

urvival and long term success of terrorist organizations largely depend on the public support that they receive from the population. Terrorist organizations strive to obtain the population’s support trough various ways; and “terrorism” is a common instrument to obtain such support. Since 1995, political wing of the PKK has been running for the Parliamentary elections at the national level, and/or municipality elections at the local level. Until the last elections in 2007, the PKK used to gradually increase its political support; however, the last election results indicated that the PKK sharply lost its political support by almost 50%. This loss of political support significantly influenced the PKK’s terrorist behavior. This research examines how the terrorist attacks changed the terrorist behavior of the PKK and where the attacks focused on after the election by comparing the terrorist attacks by the PKK in the Kurdish populated regions of Turkey between pre and post-five months periods. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using data from all initiatives and referenda on the ballot of the 49 states over the last five election cycles we examine how institutional arrangements, partisan majorities, and interest group activity affect the policy choices put before voters via the initiative and referendum processes. Legislative professionalism, responsiveness of state legislatures and characteristics of states’ interest group populations all affect the prevalence of initiatives and referenda but we find that a major driver of proposals is the changing status of party majorities within the state. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The predominant, regime-based conception of democracy has in effect dismissed individuals, conceiving of them merely as voters, and implicitly assuming that all of the necessary functions of an individual in a democracy are fulfilled in the single act of casting a ballot. But democracy resides at least as much in how engaged citizens relate to the state in the long intervals between elections as it does in the all too brief moments when voters go to the polls. And the most obvious place to look for real citizen engagement with the state is not at the national level, but at the local level. This study utilizes data on evaluations of and engagement with local governments gathered by the Afrobarometer from nearly 25,000 interviews in 20 countries in Africa during 2008. We focus particularly on who takes action in response to perceived problems in the performance of local government. The analysis explores socio-demographic (age, gender, urbanism), cognitive (education, media exposure), attitudinal (political and economic orientations) and partisan (affiliation with the ruling party) explanations for these behaviors. Not surprisingly, we find that democratic engagement with the state lags well behind democratic commitment. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The media often writes stories about the election day experience, especially if there are long lines or similar issues at the polls. However, less consideration is typically given to the problems that can occur in the absentee balloting problems, where a voter may have to wait to get a ballot in the mail from their election official. Using data from a survey of over 10,000 individuals in the 2008 presidential election, we compare the voting experience of in-person and absentee voters. We focus on the likelihood of problems in the process across various states and differences that may exist between states with broad experience with absentee voting and those states where its use is relatively restricted. We also consider how voter confidence varies across these two populations, based on their experiences with the voting mode they use. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research has suggested that voting may be a habit forming endeavor. These authors present compelling evidence that regardless of the legal barriers and the individual attributes a large number of citizens eventually move from being habitual nonvoters to habitual voters. In this paper I argue that though the habitual voting framework is a persuasive theory, it is incomplete because it ignores attitudinal and environmental factors that can influence an individual’s decision to cast a ballot regardless of one’s previous behavior. In fact, a significant number of individuals are better classified as sporadic voters. Sporadic voters differ from their habitual counterparts in that factors such as their attitudes toward the political parties and their interest in the campaign will determine if they participate in any given election. Using NES panel data, I present evidence that sporadic voters differ systematically from habitual and nonvoters. I also demonstrate how changes in perceptions between presidential elections can influence when a sporadic voter will cast a ballot. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most studies of electoral participation focus on the decision to come to the polls, usually in presidential elections. But among those individuals who choose to enter the ballot booth, I find that less than half cast a vote in all offices presented on the ballot. In America, where citizens are represented by politicians at many levels of government, vote directly on policy through ballot propositions, and even choose members of the sub-federal judiciary, millions of potential vote choices on valid ballots are left blank. In this paper, I examine the characteristics of different offices on the ballot that cause different levels of vote abstention. Using a unique compilation of copies of individual ballots cast, I show that location on the ballot and partisan contestation are the key predictors of within-ballot participation, suggesting that fatigue and heuristics determine participation within the ballot booth. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we use data from a national survey of voters in all 50 states to analyze the effect of different voting technologies on the experience of voters on election day. The main set of questions concern whether voters who cast ballots using DREs and optical scanned ballots have different experiences.x000d.and summary judgments of the voting experience. For example, were lines longer for users of one technology, were voters more confident their vote was counted as cast, and did they have different experiences with their election workers. Given the debate that exists among election officials and policy makers about electronic voting machines and paper ballots, this is a critical question and one that has practical implications for the policy community. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

California has placed two controversial social issues on its ballot in recent years. First, in 2004, Californians were asked to approve the issuance of bonds to fund embryonic stem cell research. Second, the 2008 ballot contained a question that would define marriage in the state as solely between one man and one woman. The subject matter of both of these ballot questions are focused on issues that are of great importance for many Evangelical Christian denominations and Catholics. However, does the subject matter of a ballot question alone result in voting based on religious values? Or are religious values activated by religious leaders through the use of framing? This paper uses both individual exit poll data and analysis of the vote of each county compared with its denominational demography to construct regression models to shed light on these questions. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use discontinuities in a targeting formula to test the effect of direct mail in a competitive down-ballot statewide election. Our results suggest that direct mail can have both a statistically and politically significant effect on vote choice. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use GIS software and voter files to examine the implementation of provisional balloting in several urban areas in the 2006 general election. We examine geographic patterns in the provisional ballots that are rejected by election officials. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This project seeks to explore ballot roll-off, how it is tempered by the combination of judicial and direct democracy elections, and what, if any, effect there is on specific measures involving the judiciary. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the effect that state ballot access rules have on the number of women candidates running in state legislative primaries as a way to examine how institutions structure decision calculi to run for office. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A replication of the ballot order experiment described in Koppell and Steen 2004. The method utilizes the rotation of ballot order in New York City for primaries to determine the advantage to being in the first position on the ballot. This is a replication in the same setting over a new, more varied and larger dataset. The results confirm the advantage to the first position, especially in low-salience races. The new dataset allows us to see the different ballot effects in different years, presidential, gubernatorial and local election years and as races change in salience based on their location on the ballot in different years. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Here a new electoral system, called Preferential and Proportional System Without Geographical Divisions is presented. This model's proportional representation is optimal. The error between votes cast and seat distribution is minimized. Using the seat distribution for the parties, the number of votes collected by elected officials is then maximized. It offers numerous advantages:*Each elector needs to go to his or her polling station only once to vote.*Votes in support of a specific policy cannot be diluted by the fact that several candidates are running to defend that policy.*An elector can cast a blank ballot to protest against all the proposed candidates. This result is interpreted differently from the result produced by absent voters or individuals who are unfit to vote.*Computerization makes it possible to maintain the current timeframe for the release of results. Retention of the hardcopy prevents fraud.*A multitude of candidates can run for office, including independent candidates. Hence many different ideas can be confronted in accordance with democratic principles.*Allowing voters to rally to the support of a candidate gives an opportunity to regroup to both the party in power and the opposition. Despite the large number of candidates, it is quite likely that the parliament will only include a few parties.*The "crutch" option ensures a majority government for a reduced term, instead of a shaky coalition.*Each riding could represent an equal portion of the population, to within one voter.*The Direction Générale des Élections, or its equivalent outside Québec, does not have to redefine the boundaries of electoral divisions between elections, a process both costly and debatable.*Each elected official represents a disseminated sample of the population, which encourages him or her to defend common interests. Therefore, ministers have no political interest in favouring any specific group when deciding on the location of a plant, an airport, a hospital or a museum for example. This system subjects the country/province/municipality to the same rules to a greater extent than it promotes exceptions by region.*It is very unlikely that a candidate would be attributed the same electors as in a previous election. In this way, a party leader or a minister is not always elected by the same voters.*The model generally attributes one elected official per riding, which means voters continue to feel represented by "their" candidate. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tests a model predicting the choice of party ballot in an open primary system by using official election data for Clarke County, Georgia, during 1996-2006. This heavily Democratic community converted local offices to nonpartisan in 2006, which meant that voters no longer had to choose between the Democratic and Republican ballots based on the perceived impacts of their choice on both upper-level and local offices.Results of a probit analysis indicate that both individual and contextual factors were associated with a voter's ballot choice. Choosing a Republican primary ballot was negatively related to being female and the presence of a competitive Democratic primary for mayor. Whites were more likely to choose the Republican ballot, but an uncompetitive Democratic primary for mayor was positively related to the choice to participate in the Republican primary. Surprisingly, the 2006 change to nonpartisan local elections (and a different election date) was negatively related to choosing a Republican ballot, possibly because of the hotly contested Democratic primary for governor. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents findings from an experiment in which two different ballots were used in a mock election. Results showed even small differences produced large effects. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An empirical study of whether land use patterns (sprawled growth, indicated by increased population/lower density) or demographics (wealth/minority presence) better predict appearance and passage of open space preservation ballot measures. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using field and lab-based experiments, we evaluate voters' ability to cast a write-in on six electronic voting systems. The success rate was about 90%. With paper ballots, voters often fail to fill in the oval; their votes would not be counted. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper applies ecological inference to data from states using the straight-ticket option to estimate the racial/political dimensions of its use, thus making it possible to gauge the impact of its gradual disappearance from the balloting process. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electronic voting systems offer the promise of faster and more accurate voting, but the current reality is that few of the systems have been independently tested for voter usability issues. This study reports on a large-scale field experiment in which we investigated the usability of six voting systems representing a variety of interfaces (optical scan, touch screen, buttons and dials, membrane buttons) and other characteristics (including portion of ballot visible, advancing mechanism, paper trail). The subject pool included demographic variation and over-represented the elderly and others who were inexperienced with computers. The ballot included a variety of tasks required of voters (including voting in partisan and non-partisan races and in offices with more than one winner, casting a write-in vote, and making a change). The findings demonstrate that these systems are viewed favorably, though with substantial variations across machine characteristics and tasks required. They are also more or less challenging for different types of voters. Our results suggest numerous possibilities for improvements in electronic voting systems as well as suggest the need for continued usability testing. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explore the extent to which the adoption of the Australian ballot marked a departure in the re-election behavior of House members in regards to committee assignments, party voting, and pork barrel expenditures. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Democracies developed legal ways of controlling the outcome of elections other than through the extent of the franchise. We found creative legal exclusions entrenched in the regulation of suffrage for all countries of the world (1776-2004). ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2004, the Election Assistance Commission collected local level election data, from voter registration to casting and counting of ballots. As a consultant to the EAC, I overview the data and provide analysis of provisional and absentee balloting ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to reconstruct concentration effect of mixed member systems on party systems using agent-based simulations. Simulations rest on the spatial model of ideology and studies about interaction effects between two ballots. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses county-level data to analyze the results of statewide referenda on same-sex marriage in 2004. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using data from recent provincial elections in Ontario, this paper investigates various factors associated with the casting of blank ballots. The paper also examines the relationship between blank ballotsand rational choice theory of voting. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines whether ballot measures concerning moral issues (in general) as well as comparing individual types of moral issues, have an impact on voter turnout. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous empirical research and other related research from survey methodology holds that candidates listed first on an election ballot gain some measure of advantage from this ballot placement. Using data from the 1998, 2000, and 2002 general election. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I consider statistical methods to detect election fraud using, alternately, precinct level data and ballot image data with information about the machine on which each ballot was cast. I illustrate the methods using data from recent American elections ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ballot Propositions and Political Interest: Information, Engagement and Participation ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of newspaper endorsements of state ballot questions. It compares endorsements from a state's two major newspapers on ballot referenda over several decades and assesses their effects on voting behavior. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We conducted a mixed quantitative and qualitative analysis on whether state election laws helped caused the decline of third-parties over the twentieth century. To our surprise, we found virtually no relationship between ballot access restrictions and third-party failure. The Australian ballot hurt and fusion laws help third-parties, but neither can explain much of the decline after 1900. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Absentee voting, especially voting by mail, is growing in popularity throughout the nation. Little is known about the resolution of ballots cast by mail, a question this paper seeks to answer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on measuring county policies, the study examines the implementation of California counties' implementation of three policies enacted by statewide ballot initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]