Making Political Choices: Canada and the United States

Recent national elections in Canada and the United States have been exciting, consequential contests. In 2006, the Conservative Party of Canada won a fragile victory, replacing a scandal-ridden Liberal government. In the prior 2004 federal election, the Liberals had narrowly clung to power after a volatile and bitter battle with the new Conservative Party. In the 2000 American presidential election, Republican candidate George W. Bush became the first candidate in over 100 years to capture the presidency without a majority popular vote. In 2004, Bush finally attained a narrow popular mandate, but only after a hard fought campaign. Then, in 2006, the Republicans suffered a stunning reversal of political fortune, losing control of both Houses of Congress, as public opinion turned massively against the President.    In Making Political Choices: Canada and the United States, Harold Clarke, Allan Kornberg, and Thomas Scotto employ a wealth of new survey data to describe these elections and evaluate competing theories of party support and voter turnout. While examining various arguments about forces affecting political participation and party support, the authors contend that a valence politics model provides a powerful explanation of voting behaviour in Canada, the United States, and other mature democracies.    Harold D. Clarke is the Ashbel Smith Professor of Political Science, University of Texas at Dallas, and Adjunct Professor of Government at the University of Essex. He is the author of numerous books and articles, including A Polity on the Edge: Canada and the Politics of Fragmentation with Allan Kornberg and Peter Wearing (Broadview, 2000) and Political Choice in Britain with David Sanders, Marianne C. Stewart, and Paul Whiteley (Oxford University Press, 2004). Allan Kornberg is the Norb F. Schaefer Professor of Political Science at Duke University. He is the author of Citizens and Community: Political Support in a Representative Democracy with Harold Clarke (Cambridge University Press, 1992) and has written widely in books and journals on political parties, legislatures, and comparative political behaviour.  Thomas J. Scotto is Lecturer in the Department of Government at the University of Essex. His research interests are in American and Canadian electoral behaviour and public opinion and he has published articles in journals such as Electoral Studies and the Journal of Politics.