POLS 3120 Second Exam Review

POLS 2120
Political Parties
Second Exam Review

Campaign Finance

GENERAL provisions of FECA and The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002
- You will not need to know specific dollar limits
- Differences between presidential and congressional elections
Role of party in campaign finance
- Independent v. Coordinated expenditures
- Soft money
- Agency agreements
- bundling/cueing
- party strategy

Party in the Electorate

Determinants of voting
- Michigan model
- Challenges to the Michigan model
  - Retrospective voting
  - Macropartisanship
- Impact of candidates and issues on vote choice
Trends in Partisanship
- Dealignment
- evidence
- counter-evidence

Parties and Congressional Elections

The puzzle of midterm loss
Determinants of outcomes
- Surge and decline
- Unified/divided party control
- Exposure

Parties in State elections

Party competition
- Determinants of competition
- Impact of competition on policy
  - Policy relevance of parties
  - Aggregate- v. District-level competition
Party support patterns in Utah
Autonomy of state party systems
- Impact of federalism, population patterns

Terms you should know:

agency agreements
aggregate party competition
Buckley v. Valeo
bundling
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission
coattails
coordinated expenditures
dealignment
district-level competition
exposure
FEC v. CO Republican Federal Campaign Committee
FEC v. Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee
hard money

independent expenditures
leaners
macropartisanship
McConnell v. Federal Election Commission
Michigan Model
party identification
polarization
policy relevant parties
Ranney Index
realignment
retrospective voting
soft money
two-tiered party system

The exam will feature one of the following essay questions. Your best bet is to be prepared to answer each of them. Furthermore, it is not wise to try to anticipate which one I will select because the decision will be a random choice.

Over the last 50 years there has been a significant change in the way in which campaigns are financed in the United States. Briefly discuss these changes and how they have affected the role that political parties play in campaigns.
One dramatic phenomenon in American politics over the last 60 years is the widely perceived dealignment of the party in the electorate. Briefly review the evidence regarding the changing importance parties to the voters and discuss what this evidence means in terms of voters' attitudes toward the parties, their assessments of individual candidates, and in how they ultimately cast their vote.
To varying degrees, the electoral fates of state political parties can be relatively autonomous from those of their national level counterparts. Explain what this means and why it seems to be the case. What explanations have been offered to account for the variations across states in the degree of this autonomy.