Diana Owen

Divisive Nominating Mechanisms and Democratic Party Electoral Prospects

The purpose of this article is to explore the effect of divisive nominating campaigns within the Democratic party on the partys success in presidential elections. Divisiveness is defined as a function of the nominating method and the margin of victory. The individual and combined effects of each variable on Democratic party success is measured through bivariate, multivariate, and probit analyses. The results show that divisiveness hurts the Democratic partys prospects for winning the general election after controlling for state party orientation and incumbency. Democrats are more likely to lose states that use a divisive nominating mechanism (presidential primary) and win states that use a nondivisive mechanism (caucus). Moreover, among presidential primary states, divisiveness predicated upon margin of victory is strongly related to outcomes. Democrats are more likely to win primary states decided by wide margins and lose those states decided by narrow margins. The analysis covers every presidential primary, caucus, and general election outcome in individual states from 1932 to 1992.

Talk Radio and Evaluations of President Clinton

President Clinton has alleged that talk radio has had a negative effect on the publics perceptions of government, its leaders, and its policies. This article addresses the question of whether talk radio use is linked to evaluations of President Clinton. Using data from the Times Mirror Center for the People & the Press, the study finds that talk radio use corresponds to negative evaluations of Clintons personal qualities and job performance, as well as to perceptions that he is a liberal. However, when controls for demographic characteristics and prior political orientations are introduced into a multivariate model, the media effects are mitigated. The listening public generally is negatively predisposed toward President Clinton. Therefore, talk radio works to reinforce, and perhaps to enhance, anti-Clinton proclivities.

Congress and the Internet

Information technologies have permeated society and political life. Congress also has been incorporating these new technologies as members have established their own Web sites and acquired e-mail addresses. Using a survey of congressional offices and a content analysis of congressional Web sites, we describe how Congress as an institution uses the Internet to disseminate information to the public and how individual members of Congress use the Internet and e-mail to interact with constituents. We conclude that congressional response to these technologies has been mixed and that, to the extent that members have embraced the new technologies, they have done so not to facilitate interactivity with constituents, but primarily as an extension of their strategies of advertising themselves to constituents.

Preadult Development of Political Tolerance1

This is a study of the levels and origins of political tolerance using a sample of 10- to 17-year-old Wisconsin preadults and theirparents. The respondents were interviewed by telephone three times from early 1980 to late 1981. In general, political tolerance was low, both for parents and their children. The preadults, however, exhibited greater political tolerance than did their parents. Indeed, they showed an age-related developmental pattern opposite to that of adults. For toleration of communists and of racists there were roughly the same patterns, but with some interesting differences. There were small, but significant, parent and child correspondences. Familial interpersonal communication patterns have an influence on the development of tolerance in children. Mass-mediated communication, however, is not significantly related to instilling tolerant values in children, although it is important for adults.

Internet use and the 2000 presidential election

Abstract A study of Internet use for news and information during the 2000 elections finds that, although there has been an increase in campaign uses of the Internet, online news consumption continues to be far from a dominant factor in campaign communication. Using a “uses and gratifications” framework, this study demonstrates that both the frequency of online use and the salience of the election information obtained can be explained through the particular uses of online information engaged in by audience members. Novel and interactive forms of online information were particularly important for predicting the frequency with which users accessed the Internet for news and information about elections. Audience members who actively sought information about candidates and issues tended to use the knowledge they gained online to decide how to cast their ballot.

Popular Politics and the Clinton/Lewinsky Affair: The Implications for Leadership

Perhaps more than any other episode of this scandal-ridden decade, the events surrounding the impeachment of President Bill Clinton epitomize the conflation of political and popular culture that characterizes American society. The Clinton/ Lewinsky scandal clarified, and in some ways redefined, how political and entertainment culture pertain to presidential leadership. Like Watergate, the Clinton affair constitutes a political benchmark that illuminates the relationships that have been evolving between political actors, institutions, and citizens at a particular historical juncture (Herbst, 1998). In particular, the scandal underscored the complexity of the mass medias role in relation to leadership in the current era. The publics attitudes toward President Clinton over the course of the Lewinsky matter defied established patterns of expectations, especially in light of the

“Hillbillies,” “Welfare Queens,” and “Teen Moms”: American Media’s Class Distinctions

Diana Owen focuses on the US media’s framing of social class in an historical context. After discussing the theoretical concept of media frames and its relevance for the analysis of media depictions of class, she addresses US-Americans’ self-identification with social class. The middle class, and the values associated with it, remains the central reference point of social respectability. Owen focuses her analyses on three negative stereotypes of the poor: The welfare queen, the teen mom, and the hillbilly. With a keen eye for the function of these stereotypes, Owen builds on the framing class approach to expound on its political portend. Such images, she reminds us, no matter how constructed they are, inexorably impact the social realities of the USA’s precariat.

Characteristics of US Elections in the Digital Media Age

This chapter provides a detailed discussion of the media-related characteristics of American election campaigns. Six major traits of elections in the digital era are identified: (1) technology-driven campaigning, (2) voter digital engagement, (3) hyper-personalized campaigning, (4) expanded campaign professionalization, (5) rampant polling and horserace media coverage, and (6) negativity and incivility. These developments are traced from the early days of the new media era to the present day.

Conclusion: The Development of Digital Democracy in East Asia

As a conclusion of this book, this chapter revisits the relationship between the Internet and elections. The Internet election has been evolving in somewhat different ways not only across the Pacific but also among East Asian democracies. Most notably, the degree of “Americanization” of elections is quite different among Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. This is because the Internet’s role in campaigns is influenced by contextual factors that define a country’s electoral environment. Contextual factors, especially the regulatory environment for technology and campaign finance, substantially influence the electoral process in East Asia and the United States. We also find that trends established in the era of mass media election have intensified with the rise of the Internet and digital media. Although American elections are candidate centered, parties in the United States have taken on new roles in online campaigns.