Yes we can! Valence politics and electoral choice in America, 2008

摘要: The claim that the 2008 presidential election was a transformative one is fast becoming part of conventional wisdom American politics. Despite election’s undoubted significance, this paper argues factors affecting voting decisions were strikingly similar to those operating in many previous elections. Using data from CCAP six-wave national survey, we demonstrate valence politics model provides powerful, parsimonious explanation ballot Americans made 2008. As typical elections, candidate images had major effects on electoral choice. Controlling for several other relevant factors, racial attitudes strongly associated with how voters reacted candidates. Other models choice, such as Downsian issue-proximity model, are also relevant, but their explanatory power considerably less than provided by model.