...an elected MP who will represent them in Parliament. One reason why turnout has been fallen in the general election since 1997 may be the social and economic mix of the electorate, voter turnout tends to be lower in areas of higher unemployment, below average incomes and social inactivity. These people tend to be voters of the Labour party. The Labour party in 2001 struggled to get their core votes in these comstituency’s, this proving that thousands of people feel totally disengaged from politics and at a local and national level. Another reason why turnout may be low that of disengagement of younger voters and ethnic minorities, the decline of voter participation is highest for young voters also ethnic minorities may feel as if they are not being identified with from the leading UK political parties. The election campaign is a way of determining voting behaviour yes. With the election campaign it is easy to calculate statistics to find out voting behaviour, although you cannot determine why every person is or is not voting it gives us the closest figures we can get for voting behaviour i.e. seeing what figures are from which constituency’s, in the extract we see that in Liverpool Riverside there was a voter turnout of 41.4% and in West Tyrone there was a turnout of 80.2% proving to us that there is different voting behaviour in different regions of the country. This cannot show the feelings of why people may or may not vote though, some people may feel apathy, hapathy...
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...taught is a fundamental right of being a US citizen and it should be exercised extensively as it is part of the foundation of democracy. Historically, African Americans and women did not have the right to vote in the United States but they were fought for because voting is such an essential right. Why is it that people are not exercising this right which is so important to the future of the United States? In this essay, local voter turnout in the US, Canada, and the UK will be described and explained and then compared in...
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...2016 election. Voting turnout in the United States has been on the decline since the 1960s and mobilization efforts have been in place since the 1990s, yet turnout still persists as a problem. The most appropriate way to combat this problem is simple; make voting mandatory. The definition of a democracy is a system of government by the whole population, typically through elected officials. How can we be considered a democracy then if the whole population is not being involved in the election process? The other glaring problem is that the failure to vote is highly concentrated among certain groups, namely, the poor, the unemployed, the young, new citizens, and the homeless. Without their vote in the elections, the whole opinion of the public is not complete....
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...choose the president in order to make the system more democratic. The function of the Electoral College is described in Article II Section 2 of the constitution, the constitution “does not provide that all US citizens may vote for presidential electors. Rather, it provides only that the electors shall be appointed as the state legislatures direct. Once a state determines that electors shall be chosen by popular vote it has wide latitude to determine eligibility to vote” (Hardaway 106). The electors are chosen based on the amount of House of Representatives and Senators each state has in Congress; the few hundred electors controls the United States vote (ABC News). This system is not democratic because the people are not the direct electors of the President, elite men and women of both political parties are in charge of choosing. If the system is kept that way, there is no real reason in having the eligible voters in voting because at the end of the day, their vote does not count causing various effects in the elections such as low voter turnout and lower voter efficacy.Citizens of the United States are discouraged to vote because they feel that their vote does not count since their government has established a group of people to “double-check” their preferred candidate. Why hasn’t the government abolish the Electoral College if more than 54% of the United States population believes that the popular vote should be the only counted votes? (Polling Report).Based on the polls, the...
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...been steered to support with observing for influences that will demonstration by public do not contribute in voting. It has remained a mounting difficulties with appropriate voters not registering and object their ballot. Over the decades, Americans have vanished trace with the antiquity of voting. Voting for in determinations supports in providing underpinning on why society do not participate in voting. Analyses provide tangible influences with why societies do not vote with illustration clusters support. Discovery of behaviors will show the unabridged development with the existing system supports with the American community. The 2008 elections enquiry provides awareness with the diverse motives from highest to lowest. Giving some understanding on the origin of the unruly and outcome resolutions to battle these problems. Examination can transform that are currently in domicile and assuring voting contributions on the ability to speak on the issues and distresses. Observing at other countries for potential solutions to the problem can be one riposte for the United States voting delinquent. Using tads and shards can support with altering he existing classification that does not work. Without transformation, the voting contribution will endure to diminish. The history behind the voting in America helps wonder why this pass civil liberty has fallen to many Americans waist side in today’s world. As America was still an assortment of British colonies, voting was extremely restricted...
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...Kennedy once said that “The ignorance of one voter in a democracy impairs the security of all.” When I ran across this quote I realized that today is Election Day in Massachusetts and many local voters were heading to the polls to select new leadership. Now it’s a known fact that local voter turnout is never very high. We see more middle-aged citizens and the elderly turning out for these elections which, based on the information presented in our discussion question, is about 20-30% of registered voters. But how does this tie-in to the quote. I am in agreement that a low voter turn-out is not necessarily a bad thing. These voters usually represent those voters who are knowledgeable about the issues at hand and want to see the best person for the job get elected. But does this continuous process yield a better outcome as a whole. The populace needs to be educated about the issues and understand what they are voting for. If people tend to vote on blind faith or, worse, emotion, it is an ignorant and potentially costly move for us all. In order for communities as a whole to bind together and elect the right people for the job, they must take the time and energy to get involved and to become educated on the important issues that are affecting them and their families. The question was asked in our discussion as to what kind of a program we could devise to not only increase voter turn-out but to educate the common voter in such a way as to not make them feel like an...
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...Make-up Position Paper - Wk4, Ch7 - Political Participation ASSIGNMENT INTRODUCTION - SUBMIT AS MAKEUP ONLY - READ FOR AIC. Dear class, Welcome to this week's Makeup Position Paper on Public Opinion and Participation. This make-up assignment is reserved for students who have failed to submit at least one, required position paper. Students must submit two makeup position papers in order to makeup for the credit lost on one required paper. If you wish to submit this assignment, please be sure to disable the TFE and topic text links before doing so. Furthermore, be sure to submit it in the proper folder. ASSIGNMENT BACKGROUND - IMPORTANT POINTS As usual, before I direct you to the week's assignment questions, there are a few remarks I would like to make regarding important, related issues and/or background material. Please consider the comments below, which touch upon a number of topics addressed in our text and which include a number of related observations taken from my own research. Purposes of Elections Firstly, one key point to remember is that elections, originally designed in order to allow citizens to select their own leaders, are also used by governments in order to build support for their policies. This is particularly true of parliamentary governments, which generally require simple plurality votes in order to pass sweeping legislation. In parliamentary governments, political parties are represented in direct proportion to the percentage of votes that they...
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...government but when you have it, it usually seems to work best as it provides freedom in every state and country for the people rather than autocratic states or country. Having more freedom allows people to choose and criticize their own government if they are doing a good thing for the people or not doing the right thing for example not taking into account the peoples opinion on whether or not say 16 year olds should be allowed to vote. Also even though the people of the country have the right to vote for their government they also have the extension of thinking what should their nation be like and what the policy of their nation would be. Despite this, even though they are allowed to choose their government there should be no reason to why the people cannot be as free under an autocratic government as in a democratic government. In comparison to that democracy is the best form of democracy as it represents the people of its country, making it the government by the people and with the people and for the people. The government represents the people as it was them who elected that candidate into the parliament due to their manifesto making them legit and not a slave of the people but to represent them in the world, doing the best for their country. Them now having the power doesn’t mean they can do whatever it is they want, they have a sole responsibility to represent the people and if they abuse their power then the people can throw them out and elect a new government. On the...
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...Interim Report ICT use in Getting out the Vote in recent US Presidential Elections: A Tale of Two Solutions. Xxxxxxxxxxxxx (for module ISM106) December 13, 2012 Contents. 1.0 Background and Objectives………………………………………………..3 2.0 Literature Search and Methodology………………………………………4 3.0 GOTV - The Problem Domain…………………………………………….5 4.0 Timetable……………………………………………………………………7 5.0 References…………………………………………………………………..8 “Good judgment comes from experience, but a lot of that comes from bad judgment”. Will Rogers, American Humorist (1879-1935). 1.0 Background and Objectives. Getting out the vote (GOTV) is a very important activity in an election campaign. Within a typical polling precinct, campaign fieldworkers identify and confirm voters who pledge to vote for their candidate. A list of these voters is carefully compiled for each precinct, with up-to-date contact information and whether assistance is needed in getting voters to the polling station being crucial. On Election Day, campaign workers at the polling stations monitor the voters on the list and record which have voted and which have not. Great effort is then expended on contacting the “laggards” and getting them out to vote. Periodically during the day, voter turnout data is sent, through aggregation points, to campaign HQ where it updates the big picture and allows the co-ordination and refocusing of further GOTV efforts. The purpose of...
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...Marketing Application Class A Task – Political Marketing Mohamad Alshafei (AKA Leo) 1|Page Contents 1. US presidential election 2012 Overview ..................................................................................... 3 2. Political Program and Positions ................................................................................................... 4 Barak Obama ............................................................................................................................... 4 Economic policy ....................................................................................................................... 4 Health Care .............................................................................................................................. 4 Foreign policy .......................................................................................................................... 4 Mitt Romney ................................................................................................................................ 5 Economic policy ....................................................................................................................... 5 Health Care .............................................................................................................................. 5 Foreign Policy .......................................................................................................................
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...Omar Sharif Should the Electoral College be abolished? The invention and approval of the electoral college by the Constitutional Committee in 1787 resulted in an electoral system whereby the election of the president, every 4 years, is determined by members of the electoral college and not the popular vote. Each state receives a number of electoral college votes (number of state congress members) and this is amended every 10 years to reflect changes in state populations. However, there is a growing movement to abolish and replace the current Presidential electoral system with a more democratic system that more accurately reflects the popular vote. Firstly, to understand why the electoral college became the chosen system, it is important to understand the issues faced by the Constitutional committee. James Madison wrote at the time "There was one difficulty however of a serious nature attending an immediate choice by the people. The right of suffrage was much more diffusive in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election on the score of Negroes. The substitution of electors obviated this difficulty and seemed on the whole to be liable to the fewest objections." Therefore, whilst many members acknowledged that a nationwide popular vote would be ideal, state conflict over the rights of slaves, which divided the nation, was the ultimate deciding factor in the choice of electoral system. However, there were other highly influential...
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...governments, patterns of participation in politics, the impact of constitutional reform, and the explanation for any crisis. Legitimacy There has been a decline in levels of trust in government and confidence in the political system. Thirty years ago, four in ten people in Britain trusted government to put the needs of the nation above those of their political party; today, just one in five do so. But much of this decline set in during the early 1990s, although trust and confidence have fallen further since 1997. Participation Turnout at all elections has declined since 1997, most noticeably at the 2001 general election, when the participation rate was the lowest since 1918. At the same time, levels of non-electoral participation have increased somewhat. Meanwhile, it is not the case that people engage outside the ballot box as an alternative to voting; rather, most people use non-electoral activities as a complement to participating at elections. One reason why non-electoral participation has not declined is because people generally feel as engaged with the...
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...Explain why the Hispanic vote is becoming more important in US elections (10 marks) Hispanics are a growing group in the USA in terms of politics, this can be seen through demographics, according to the 2000 census, they did form 12% of the population, but by the 2010 census this figure has increased over 16% (51 million people) this was due to immigration and birth rates, therefore over the years they have become more influential as they are now a larger proportion or the electorate. Furthermore, because they are a young group and a significant proportion are not yet of voting age, with one quarter of Hispanics being under 18, Their full political importance is yet to show as they have not yet acquired the right to vote, which is one of the main reasons the Hispanic population is known as the ‘sleeping giants’ as their full potential of their impact towards the electorate has not been ‘awoken’ due to them not being able to vote. so over the years they will become increasingly important. Many Hispanic communities are also located in several vital swing states, for example, in California, Nevada, Arizona, Texas and New Mexico. Where the Hispanics make up more than 25% of the population. Particularly in Florida where they have a high number of electoral college votes, where their votes are even more important because of the closeness of the vote in these battle ground states. The fact that Hispanics are a disparate group- from Mexico, Puerto Ricco and Cuba as well as other...
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...Ben Stevens Professor Baker-Brodersen ENG 105 23 April 2024 Why We Need Term Limits in Congress? Recently the debate regarding further term limits for elected officials has exploded, there are many arguments on whether term limits are necessary and what they would look like. This debate is still ongoing today and is hotly contested. Many states have enacted term limits on statewide positions and have seen remarkable results from these laws. Term limits are essential for us to put confidence back into our political system, term limits would help increase the number of citizens that can get involved in politics as incumbents would be vastly reduced. Another way term limits can help fix the problems in our government is by ending the possibility of lifetime tenure our elected officials have today, which in turn would help curb the corruption our...
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...pressing concern until an election year in which the public's hatred of Obamacare is expected to be the central issue. As The New York Times explained, Democrats see the minimum wage as an issue that "will place Republican candidates in a difficult position," and also as a tool "to enlarge the electorate in a nonpresidential election, when turnout among minorities and youths typically drops off." (Unlike Republicans, Democrats consider it important to win elections.) To most people, it seems as if the Democrats are giving workers something for nothing. But there are always tradeoffs. No serious economist denies that increasing the minimum wage will cost jobs. If it's not worth paying someone $10 an hour to do something, the job will be eliminated -- or it simply won't be created. The minimum wage is the perfect Democratic issue. It will screw the very people it claims to help, while making Democrats look like saviors of the working class, either by getting them a higher wage or providing them with generous government benefits when they lose their jobs because of the mandatory wage hike. Of course, the reason American workers’ wages are so low in the first place is because of the Democrats' policies on immigration. Republicans might want to point that out. Since the late 1960s,...
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