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Political scientists, journalists, and astute political observers agree that American political parties, at both the mass and elite level, have become more partisan over the past fifty years. The two national parties have increasingly moved apart on various social and economic issues, and elected representatives have become more ideologically divided over time. In response to party polarization, rank-and-file party identifiers have further sorted themselves into the Republican and Democratic parties. Their evaluation of political figures, as well as their positions over a range of political issues, is more likely to be influenced by their party identification now than decades ago. Yet when one closely examines the overall distributions of ideology and public opinions, one can hardly detect any changes in them over time. The electorate remains largely ideologically centrist and moderate. Given frequent elections and the prevalence of watchdog groups and a savvy media, one would expect that representatives who deviate ideologically from the preferences of their constituents would get voted out. In principle, one would expect any electoral disconnect to diminish, if not completely disappear in the long run. Yet in reality, the opposite is true --- the electoral disconnect between the overall attitudes of the mass public and those of elites appears to have widened over time. The empirical puzzle is: How can party polarization be sustained when the constituents who elect them are not ideologically divided? The answer is geography. Federal elections are geographically-based. There are four hundred and thirty five separate electoral districts for House seats, and fifty districts for Senate seats. Congressional members are single-minded re-election seekers who are held accountable to their home constituents---not to the national electorate. In order to understand what contributes to party polarization and electoral disconnect, one must begin by studying the spatial composition of voters across geographic regions. I argue that the increasingly skewed spatial distribution of partisan preferences, which I refer to as `geographic polarization of partisan preferences', holds the key to the empirical puzzle.There are two ways in which geographic polarization of partisan preferences can occur. One is through electoral behavioral change; another is through spatial compositional change. By electoral behavioral change, I refer primarily to party sorting that began after 1980. As the two national parties pull apart ideologically, voters can easily differentiate between the major parties and align themselves with the political party that lies closer to their political preferences. Because of party sorting, the connection between a person's socio-demographic characteristics and his or her partisan preference strengthens over time.By spatial composition change, I refer to the condition in which the demographic make-up of geographic regions (or electoral districts) gets altered over time in ways that are politically relevant. There are two mechanisms that can induce spatial compositional change. The first mechanism is selective migration. When individuals' politically relevant socio-demographic characteristics and lifestyle preferences are correlated with both the migration decision and residential choice, then voters become geographically sorted over time in ways that matter for their political choices. The second mechanism is place-varying generational replacement. The conventional notion of generational replacement suggests that cohorts coming of age in different time (or political) periods might develop distinct partisan preferences or beliefs. As younger cohorts replace older cohorts, the overall composition of the electorate might then change. While such conventional generational replacement continues to take place, I show that, after 1980, there is an additional form of generational replacement that is spatially dependent. In addition to the time in which one comes of age, the place in which one comes of age also matters. In California, I demonstrate that younger voters coming of age in pro-Democratic regions (the Bay Area and Los Angeles County) are systematically more likely to identify as Democrats than those growing up in pro-Republican regions. As these younger cohorts age, the spatial disparity in term of partisan preferences widens.I use California as a case study because it is a very large and diverse state. There are many unique historic data, including individual-level opinion polls, voter registration data and yearly county-level demographic data. By assembling and examining various datasets, I show that selective migration began long before elite polarization resumed in Congress in the 1960s. Migration patterns have largely been stable over the past few decades. They are mostly driven by economic considerations and not by religious preferences. Over time, the accumulation of selective migration results in an increasingly skewed spatial distribution of voters of various socio-demographic characteristics. When the two national political parties began to pull apart on social and economic issues during the Reagan administration, voters took the cues and became more sorted by partisanship. Party sorting had two political impacts. First, it led to the onset of place-varying generational replacement. Second, it further accentuated the connection between the skewed spatial distribution of social-demographic characteristics and aggregate partisan preferences. Consequently, geographic polarization began to emerge in 1980 and continued to increase over time. Prior to 1980, counties in California used to have fairly similar partisan preferences. The moderate, centrist distribution of ideology among voters was reflected by a bell-shape distribution of partisan preferences at the county level. By 2000, the distribution of partisan preferences at the county level had become bimodal --- counties either had gone more pro-Democratic or pro-Republican, with very few electorally competitive counties in between. Through the interaction of electoral behavioral changes and spatial compositional changes, the moderate, centrist electorate is now spatially arranged in partisan polarized districts. These districts perpetuate party polarization at the elite level as Congressional candidates must appeal to either strongly Democratic or strongly Republican electorates within their districts. Lastly, I argue that since party sorting and the pattern of selective migration are deeply entrenched in the electorate, geographic polarization and electoral disconnect are likely to be sustained in the long run.

The article is devoted to the study of the role of citizens in elections, electoral rights and electoral disputes in the implementation of the concept of direct democracy in Ukraine. The author shows that the people are the bearer of sovereignty and the only source of power in Ukraine. It has been shown that, despite the progress made by many countries in building democratic institutions and protecting human rights, the state of democracy in some regions of the world is still fragile and their institutions are too weak to ensure effective governance. The author argues that, in order to ensure free elections as the main indicator of the existence of democracy in Ukraine, it is first of all worth moving away from the positivist (formal) approach when applying electoral legislation and other election process regulators. Any difference in understanding of the procedure should be interpreted in the way of the protection of electoral rights and their implementation. The internal nature of electoral law should be the same. ; Исследована роль выборов, избирательных прав и избирательных споров граждан в реализации концепции непосредственного народовластия в Украине. Автор показывает, что носителем суверенитета и единственным источником власти в Украине является народ. Несмотря на прогресс, достигнутый многими странами в сфере построения демократических институтов и прав человека, состояние демократии в некоторых регионах мира по-прежнему неустойчиво, а их институты слишком слабы для обеспечения эффективного управления. Автор обосновывает утверждение, что для обеспечения свободных выборов как основного показателя наличия демократии в Украине, прежде всего, стоит отойти от позитивистского (формального) подхода при применении избирательного законодательства и других регуляторов избирательных процедур. Любое неодинаковое понимание процедуры должно трактоваться в сторону защиты избирательных прав и их реализации. Такой же должна быть внутренняя сущность избирательного законодательства. ; Досліджено ролі виборів, виборчих прав та виборчих спорів громадян у реалізації концепції безпосереднього народовладдя в Україні. Автор показує, що носієм суверенітету та єдиним джерелом влади в Україні є народ. Незважаючи на прогрес, досягнутий багатьма країнами у сфері побудови демократичних інститутів і захисту прав людини, стан демократії в деяких регіонах світу, як і раніше, нестійкий, а їхні інститути надто слабкі для забезпечення ефективного управління. Автор обґрунтовує думку, що з метою забезпечення вільних виборів як основного показника наявності демократії в Україні насамперед варто відійти від позитивістського (формального) підходу під час застосування виборчого законодавства й інших регуляторів виборчих процедур. Будь-яке неоднакове розуміння процедури має трактуватися в бік захисту виборчих прав та їх реалізації. Такою ж має бути внутрішня сутність виборчого законодавства.

In Iran were in June elections and thus the replacement of President Ahmadinejad. Iran's strongest opponents in the nuclear dispute, the US and Israel had even just elected new governments in their offices. This new constellation led as early as spring 2013 to a less aggressive rhetoric towards Iran, as it was even during the election campaigns in the fall of 2012 the fall. Progress in the nuclear negotiations, which have now been confirmed, were expected for the period after the Iranian elections. Adapted from the source document

The purpose of this study is to identify and examine the implementation and impact of transactional politics in regional elections on regional development. The research method used is a normative method that uses secondary data sources or data obtained through literature, books, etc. The results of the study conclude that there are various problems related to the practice of political dowry, such as the mechanism for selecting regional head candidates within the party which is difficult to monitor and there is no transparency. The practice of unreasonable political dowry in the regional elections also has a negative impact on development progress in the regions. For example, costs that are too high will have an impact on the possibility of greater corruption.Keywords: Regional election; regional development; transnational politicsAbstrakTujuan penelitian ini untuk mengetahui dan mengkaji implementasi dan dampak politik transaksional dalam pilkada terhadap pembangunan di daerah. Metode penelitian yang digunakan adalah metode normatif yang menggunakan sumber data sekunder atau data yang diperoleh melalui literatur kepustakaan, buku, dll. Hasil penelitian menyimpulkan bahwa terdapat berbagai problematika berkaitan dengan praktik mahar politik seperti mekanisme pemilihan calon kepala daerah di dalam partai yang sulit diawasi dan belum adanya transparansi. Praktik mahar politik yang tidak wajar dalam pilkada juga berdampak buruk terhadap kemajuan pembangunan di daerah. Misalnya biaya yang terlampau tinggi akan berdampak pada kemungkinan tindak korupsi yang lebih besar.Kata Kunci: Pilkada; politik transaksional; pembangunan daerah

This article aims to take photos and browse in critical problems of democracy and transparency of the Kebangkitan Bangsa Party in the recruitment of candidates in the 2019 elections. The recruitment process in political parties includes three stages, namely certification, nomination, and election. Through qualitative research with analytical-critical description method, this paper argues that the mechanism of political recruitment in the Kebangkitan Bangsa Party through an undemocratic and untransparent process, where prospective legislative candidates who register to become prospective legislative candidates only submit registration forms and various completeness of the other files and henceforth the prospective candidates are only waiting for the process of determining the serial number of candidate by the leadership of political parties. In addition, the position number is determined without going through the readiness and competency test mechanism of the candidates.

Since the North American presidential election of 2016, the role of social media on the propagation of misleading news and its instrumentalization by partisan groups has raised concerns. In this article we analyse the contents of 47 Facebook pages and 39 Facebook groups prior to the Portuguese parliamentary election of 6th of October of 2019 to track disinformation. Groups and pages to monitor were selected through a process that combined the number of fans or members, the proportion of political content, and the number of posts per week. We concluded that disinformative content was prevalent in the pages and groups monitored, that several political actors had a relevant influence on the debate and that most disinformation stemmed from the spinning of both mainstream and non-mainstream news to serve a political purpose.

Though ostensibly tasked with enforcing their respective nations' campaign finance laws, the Federal Election Commission ("FEC"), Australian Electoral Commission ("AEC"), and Electoral Commission ("EC") are woefully unable to meaningfully address the evolving nature of campaigns or enforce existing regulations in the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom, respectively. Attempts at enforcement are cut off at the knees by political infighting, half-hearted grants of independent authority, and a lack of institutional support. Conversely, the New York City Campaign Finance Board ("CFB") is recognized as an example of meaningful enforcement and relative political independence. By implementing changes that translate the CFB's municipally-successful structure to federal agencies, the FEC, AEC and EC could become more effective in the enforcement of existing laws and better at adapting to the changing face of elections.

AbstractParty identification is a central concept in studies of parties and elections. Drawing from an extensive literature linking the concept of party identification to the understanding of Mexico's electoral politics, this article explores how the Mexican experience informs the understanding of party identification in general, especially in emerging democracies. There, voters' attachments to political parties are usually seen both as essential to and a positive sign of democratic development. This study finds evidence consistent with these arguments in the Mexican case but also identifies aspects of Mexican party identification that are not so clearly supportive of democratic politics; that indeed may delay or even undermine democratization. These findings illustrate the relevance of the Mexican experience to the wider literature on parties and elections, particularly the well-documented relationship between party identifications and democratization.

According to "Western" models, there are three different stages of electioneering. In Indonesia, elements of these different stages are now combined. The result is not a comprehensive "Americanization", but a professionalization, along with a hybridization of indigenous and foreign methods. At the beginning, the elections of 1955 were marked by a localized campaign and the absence of TV, pollsters and consultants. The long suppression of electoral politics (from 1957 until 1998) has decelerated the transition toward new forms of electioneering. Technological change, institutional reforms (especially the introduction of direct presidential and direct local elections), the general dealignment of political parties, and the extraordinary rise of pollsters and consultants have effected a professionalization and commercialization of campaigning since the fall of Suharto. Political parties are now tending to become more market-oriented. Adapted from the source document.

Strong institutional constraints and better-informed voters may lead re-election seeking incumbents to shift the use of political business cycle mechanisms away from monetary and fiscal policy towards other policy domains that are more easily manipulable, targetable, and timeable. We investigate teacher employment patterns at the state level in Germany and find strong evidence of cycling mechanisms, in the form of electioneering and honeymooning. Against a backdrop of a continuously shrinking total teachers' pool, German state-level incumbents accelerate the hiring of new teachers during election periods and partly reverse this during politically safer points in the electoral cycle. Cycles are mediated by issue salience: heightened attention to German public schooling after the notorious PISA-2000 tests further strengthens the manipulation of new teacher hiring for electoral purposes. Adapted from the source document.

This paper discusses Canada's approach to voter registration for federal & (most) provincial elections during much of the 20th century. A key principle was that the state would bear responsibility for ensuring that all eligible citizens were listed as electors, which it would do by a door-to-door enumerator-based canvass. Conducted shortly before an election, the canvass served to involve citizens in the electoral process, enhance voter participation, & provide the most accurate address information. The enumeration system was replaced by the National Register of Electors after a final enumeration in Apr 1997. Explaining why the change was made & evaluating the performance of the new system in facilitating electoral participation are the foci of this paper. A postscript notes improvements in the new system, especially to take into account low income & ethnic diversity in voter registration. Tables, Figures. J. Stanton