State Parties and State Party Delegations to National Party Conventions.

In this paper, we examine whether a state's party context influences the incentives for involvement, the norms of party decision-making, and the specific campaign commitments expressed by a select group of party activists -- delegates to both parties' 2000 national conventions. We look specifically at the rules for delegate selection (e.g. open primary, closed caucus, etc.), the institutional capacity of state parties, and the electoral competitiveness between the two parties at the state level. Using data from a survey of the 2000 national convention delegates, we find some evidence that norms and campaign commitments respond to state party contexts, but little evidence that incentives do. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of our findings and some directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]