Moshe Haspel

Location, Location, Location: Precinct Placement and the Costs of Voting

This article provides a new measure of voting costs by using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) tools to calculate the distance between the residence and polling place for registered voters in the city of Atlanta. Using this measure to predict turnout at the individual level, we find that small differences in distance from the polls can have a significant impact on voter turnout. We also find that moving a polling place can affect the decision to vote. In addition to providing a better understanding of the costs of voting, our findings have important implications regarding the location of polling places and the effects of altering precinct boundaries.

The Content of Political Participation: Letters to the Editor and the People Who Write Them

rrEi Letters to the editor are an important but poorly understood form of voluntary political participation. To learn more about the content of letters to the editor and the characteristics of the people who write them we conducted a content analysis of 1,415 randomly selected printed letters from eight newspapers from 2002 to 2005. We also matched the letter writers from our sample to demographic and political information con tained in a state voterfile.

Party Building through Campaign Finance Reform: Conditional Party Government in the 104th Congress

During this century, the electoral fortunes of members of Congress have become less a function of party affiliation, and more a function of personal relationships with their constituencies. With the Campaign Finance Reform Act of 1996, House Republican leaders sought to reinvigorate the role of the national parties in financing congressional campaigns. Guided by Conditional Party Government theory, we explore reasons a member of Congress might have for supporting such legislation. We find that a members likelihood of supporting this party-strengthening bill is highly sensitive to his or her ideological distance to the right or left of the party leadership.

Should party in parliament be weak or strong? The rules debate in the Russian state Duma

In the very first days of its existence, the Russian Duma made crucial decisions determining that, unlike its predecessor, it would be a legislature based on parliamentary factions. Analysis of the Rules debate in the Duma reveals the goals behind this decision. Specifically, the ‘patriotic’ forces in the Duma needed parliamentary parties to facilitate their struggle against President Yeltsin. In turn, the ‘democrats’ needed parliamentary parties to oppose the ‘patriotic forces’ within the parliament. Thus, democratic and patriotic groups alike found common interests as factions, and these cut across traditional left‐right politics. In turn, by choosing rules that favour parliamentary parties, the deputies created incentives for temporary electoral associations to seek more permanent co‐operation.

Campaign Finance Reform as Institutional Choice: Party Difference in the Vote to Ban Soft Money

If the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) of 2002 banned the use of soft money—the only source of funds in which Democrats approached parity with Republicans—why did the Republican congressional leadership revile the bill and the Democratic congressional leadership embrace it? We address this puzzle by modeling competing electoral, partisan, and policy motives that guided members’ decision making on the vote for final passage of this bill. Our solution lies in the fact that members believed that BCRA would reduce the role of the national parties in congressional elections. Although the parties may behave similarly under a fixed electoral regime, we find that the BCRA vote is consistent with two parties that prefer different sets of electoral rules. Specifically, Democrats appear more sympathetic to changes that enhance the role of candidates and outside groups, whereas Republicans appear to prefer stronger national parties.

Committees in the Russian State Duma: Continuity and Change in Comparative Perspective

The Russian Constitution adopted in 1993 created new legislative institutions with fewer formal powers than their predecessor, the Congress of Peoples Deputies. The new lower house or State Duma is elected on a multi‐party basis, causing changes in the parliaments internal structure as well. This paper argues that the internal relations, external relations and functions of parliamentary committees in the Russian Duma are changing as a result of the growing strength of parties in that body. Specifically, the introduction of parties has strengthened representation in the Duma, but has been detrimental to overall legislative effectiveness.