The Party Decides: Presidential Nominations Before and After Reform (Chicago Studies in American Politics) Illustrated Edition

by Marty Cohen (Author), David Karol (Author), Hans Noel (Author),

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ISBN-13: 978-0226112374

ISBN-10: 0226112373

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Throughout the contest for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, politicians and voters alike worried that the outcome might depend on the preferences of unelected superdelegates. This concern threw into relief the prevailing notion that—such unusually competitive cases notwithstanding—people, rather than parties, should and do control presidential nominations. But for the past several decades, The Party Decides shows, unelected insiders in both major parties have effectively selected candidates long before citizens reached the ballot box.

Tracing the evolution of presidential nominations since the 1790s, this volume demonstrates how party insiders have sought since America’s founding to control nominations as a means of getting what they want from government. Contrary to the common view that the party reforms of the 1970s gave voters more power, the authors contend that the most consequential contests remain the candidates’ fights for prominent endorsements and the support of various interest groups and state party leaders. These invisible primaries produce frontrunners long before most voters start paying attention, profoundly influencing final election outcomes and investing parties with far more nominating power than is generally recognized.

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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Marty Cohen is assistant professor of political science at James Madison University.

David Karol is assistant professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley.

Hans Noel is assistant professor of government at Georgetown University.

John Zaller is professor of political science at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Product details

Publisher : University of Chicago Press; Illustrated edition (October 1, 2008)
Language: : English
Paperback : 416 pages
ISBN-10 : 0226112373
ISBN-13 : 978-0226112374
Item Weight : 1.38 pounds
Dimensions : 6 x 1.1 x 9 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #707,142 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #701 in Political Parties (Books)
- #1,047 in Government
- #1,146 in Elections

Customer Reviews:
19 ratings

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Don Anderson

The person alone does not rule.

Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2015

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Good argument that one never votes for a person without voting for the party as well. One person alone cannot do much. One must always look at the persons ability to work with and influence others on the party. The candidate alone does not rule. They join a party that rules. This is why our system is difficult to change. It takes a party yet we too often elect people who can't work together.

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Robert B

Dense, but informative read!

Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2013

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I read this book for class and it provides plenty of great insights into the American political system, especially parties. It is an advanced style of writing for non-political scientists, but if you're interested in reading into how political nominations and parties function this is the book for you!

2 people found this helpful

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kuku

Quite good

Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2016

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Quite good.

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Paul Hosea

has good information, good stories

Reviewed in the United States on October 13, 2015

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This book seeks to prove a point to an academic audience. Yet the authors also want to entertain and inform a popular audience. These goals conflict and it shows. They keep loosing me when they repeat their point and its proofs ad nauseum. This research paper...excuse me...book... has good information, good stories, and good ideas. But it simply doesn't come together well, especially for a non-specialist reader.

4 people found this helpful

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Juliemania

Kindle version is great.

Reviewed in the United States on April 9, 2013

Verified Purchase

Writing this simply to let any student know that this textbook looks great on the Kindle. I love that I can search, highlight, notate and that the dictionary is called up on a finger press on a word. I am using 3 textbooks on my Kindle this term.

4 people found this helpful

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Marty McFly

The only must-read book for presidential campaigns

Reviewed in the United States on December 25, 2011

Cohen, Karol, Noel, and Zaller bridge the gap between academics' deep knowledge of political behavior and practitioners' sense of how elite politics actually work to produce perhaps the finest single bok on presidential politics in the past 25 years. The Party Decides deserves a spot beside classics such as Richard Neustadt's Presidential Power--and if your shelves only have room for one volume, junk Neustadt. In accessible but rigorous language, the authors lay out a persuasive theory of how partisan elites shape the selection of American presidential candidates, exercising their considerable power in a way that's both transparent--you can watch it happen in Iowa, in New Hampshire, and the pages of Politico!--but almost invisible because it's so transparent.

5 people found this helpful

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Brian

contains claims important to somebody -- probably not you

Reviewed in the United States on December 26, 2013

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I can't seem to stop setting down this book and to finish it would be a waste of time. It's long for what it has to say. I feel an effort to pare it down and sharpen what remains could perhaps have made the difference between the reject pile and something to tolerate. There are no less than 4 authors and it shows. It was amusing to see that the authors think they are setting out to prove something contrarian, unobvious, and perhaps mildly unexpected. However, I get the impression they are trying to challenge some imagined prevailing view. If the authors succeed then what this book accomplishes is subtle and I don't care whether they can or cannot find distinctions between their perceptions and something some journalist or academic said on a particular occasion. In any such endeavour, if you look around even just a little bit you will inevitably find an article by somebody somewhere at some point in time that enables you to establish some sort of contrast. Some of it is straw-maning and the exaggeration or over-simplification of an opposing view. It's irritating to realize I have purchased a book where straw-maning is so easy to spot. I don't get the impression that what they are setting out to disprove needs to be disproved because I never believed that "the party does *Not* decide". The subject is not an orthodoxy that I care about if it even exists. I bought this on a recommendation and I was hoping that it would have been useful as a rich collection of anecdotes from insiders and an opinionated analysis of the political scene. This book is not that.

11 people found this helpful

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Kevin Cazares

A thorough, fact-based theory on political party formation

Reviewed in the United States on March 20, 2009

How political parties form could be a subject too esoteric to gain interest outside of academic circles. But an understanding of what makes a political party, from intense policy demanders, to their long coalition, has merit to anyone curious about the American political process. The notion that American political parties are passing away is a widely disseminated one. Using copious amounts of statistical data, this book tells a different story. Hardly a potboiler, this book portrays the a history of political parties in an insightful way that will lead one to a different conclusion. You may disagree, but the authors have tried very hard to prove otherwise.

9 people found this helpful

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Antonio Cobelo

Lectura muy recomendable para los interesados en asuntos políticos y electorales

Reviewed in Spain on September 20, 2019

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Es un libro que se está convirtiendo en clásico a pesar de que solo tiene unos pocos años de publicado. A partir del análisis del papel de los aparatos de los partidos políticos americanos en las elecciones primarias, casi sin proponérselo, elabora un análisis de lo que son los partidos hoy día, en la época de las redes sociales y los blogs, del poder de los aparatos burocráticos, discutido y a veces despreciado, del poder de los diversos grupos (De interés, ideológicos, feministas, ecologistas, etc...) que tratan de influenciar las primarias y la acción de los dirigentes electos, etc. Creo que es un libro de lectura muy recomendable para cualquiera que se interese por estos asuntos, bien desde la política activa, desde la Universidad o simplemente como ciudadano.

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