Blogging the Bookshelf

Blogging my bookshelf – one book at a time

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Entries Tagged as 'Campaigning'

Political Behaviour as a Pro-Social Activity – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg

December 6th, 2012 · Comments Off on Political Behaviour as a Pro-Social Activity – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg · Campaigning, Democracy, Politics, Psychology, Social Psychology

Rogers and Grebner were coming from a different set of questions but arriving at a similar understanding of what drove political activity. No one decided to vote in a vacuum, and interpersonal interactions mattered. In fact, their psychologically minded tests and feints were moving toward something that felt very familiar to Gerber. Rogers’s project to […]

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The Importance of Voter Contact – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg

December 6th, 2012 · Comments Off on The Importance of Voter Contact – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg · Campaigning, Politics

When the results of the experiment came in, the phone calls showed no influence in getting people to vote. The direct-mail program increased turnout a modest but appreciable 0.6 percentage points for each postcard sent. (The experiment sent up to three pieces per household.) But the real revelation was in the group of voters successfully […]

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Political Advice and Story Telling – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg

December 5th, 2012 · Comments Off on Political Advice and Story Telling – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg · Campaigning, Data, Narrative, Politics

“A lot of what gets done on campaigns gets done on the basis of anecdotal evidence, which often comes down to who is a better storyteller. Who tells a better story about what works and what doesn’t work?” says Christopher Mann, a former executive director of the New Mexico Democratic Party. .. The people who […]

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The Deep Seated Paranoia and Insecurity of Political Parties – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg

December 1st, 2012 · Comments Off on The Deep Seated Paranoia and Insecurity of Political Parties – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg · Campaigning, Politics, Progressive Politics

The best way to get anyone to do anything on the Democratic side—and I’m sure it’s the reverse on the Republican side—is to tell people that the Republicans are doing it. It doesn’t matter: the Republicans could be doing something completely stupid, but if you tell the Democrats they get scared and think they should […]

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The Short Half-Life of Political TV Ads – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg

November 30th, 2012 · Comments Off on The Short Half-Life of Political TV Ads – “The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns”, Sasha Issenberg · Campaigning, Political Communication, Politics

The ads may have delivered sizable effects on the weeks in which they ran, the eggheads concluded, but they decayed rapidly. Much of Weeks’s folklore was right: if your goal was to move public opinion, it made sense to wait to go on TV until you would be able to sustain the buy.

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Tags:·Political Ads·

People Came to This Country for Either Money or Freedom – “Freedom: A Novel”, Jonathan Franzen

October 27th, 2012 · Comments Off on People Came to This Country for Either Money or Freedom – “Freedom: A Novel”, Jonathan Franzen · Campaigning, Politics, US Politics, USA

People came to this country for either money or freedom. If you don’t have money, you cling to your freedoms all the more angrily. Even if smoking kills you, even if you can’t afford to feed your kids, even if your kids are getting shot down by maniacs with assault rifles. You may be poor, […]

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Tags:·Freedom·individualism·Labor·liberalism··progressive·

Field’s Life as a Rat – A Post Script – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn

October 20th, 2012 · Comments Off on Field’s Life as a Rat – A Post Script – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn · Australian Labor Party, Campaigning, Democracy, Politics, Progressive Politics, Queensland

Once the coup had taken place and the election was on, Field – a senator for just ninety-nine days – was quickly forgotten. Legal aid to help him fight five High Court writs stopped, promises of state government monetary aid did not materialise, and his previous ‘patrons’, the Queensland Liberal-National parties, put him at number […]

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Tags:Betrayal·Labor·Loyalty·Preferences·Rats·The Senate

What The Shah Told Joh – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn

October 19th, 2012 · Comments Off on What The Shah Told Joh – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn · Australian Labor Party, Campaigning, Communism, Extremism, Politics, Queensland

At Stanthorpe, Queensland’s fruit-growing centre he said: “Australians, wake up, we are on a dangerous course with these people. The Shah of Iran told me when he was here he was disturbed that we were going to communism.  Australians keep coming to me saying to do everything I can do to fight Canberra. They say […]

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Tags:··Sir Joh

National Party Freedom Bonds – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn

October 18th, 2012 · Comments Off on National Party Freedom Bonds – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn · Campaigning, Political Communication, Politics, Queensland

For its part, the National Party – fighting its first state election under a new name – approached the election with patriotic fervour. So much so that in the campaign the party put “freedom bonds” up for sale at $10 to $100, making them, intentionally, like war bonds. The party justified this by saying the […]

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Tags:·Political Advertising····Sir Joh

A Bad Campaign Speech – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn

October 18th, 2012 · Comments Off on A Bad Campaign Speech – “Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Johannes Bjelke-Petersen”, Hugh Lunn · Australian Labor Party, Campaigning, Political Communication, Politics, Progressive Politics

Joh set such a campaign pace in 1974 that he made it difficult for his ALP opponent Tucker to keep up. Tucker’s chartered plane got lost in a storm while flying to Quilpie in the West. The plane was half an hour overdue when Tucker himself used a road map to help the pilot establish […]

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Tags:·Elections·Labor··