Chapter 8 Overview Political campaigns can be one of the most powerful expressions of popular democracy. Campaigns can provide the information and ideas that allow citizens to debate and determine their preferences.
Citizens are able to communicate their choices and hold leaders accountable through voting.
But the personalized, money-driven, and professionalized character of most modern campaigns thwarts popular democratic aspirations. Today s candidate-centered campaigns emphasize the personalities and characters of political hopefuls. With the decline of party strength and party identification, and with little knowledge of issues by the electorate or generation of them by the candidate, campaigns focus on dramatic symbols and the creation of appealing images. Their outcomes often turn on how candidates handle the pressure of media scrutiny a far cry from being assessed in light of one s ideas or policy proposals. In presidential campaigns, candidates can seemingly come from nowhere and seize the spotlight.