Dear Colleagues:

Any handicapper would have to say that whoever gets the Republican nomination for President is likely to win the 2012 election. Incumbents do not do well when unemployment is high and their base is demoralized.

Yet all of the candidates seem to have flaws that discourage Republican political leaders from rallying around them. That isn’t so unusual (see the Democratic field in 2004), but this Republican campaign appears particularly quirky. In every year since 1979, the winner of the straw poll at the Florida Republican convention the year before the election has gone on to be the party’s nominee. This year’s winner was former Godfathers Pizza CEO Herman Cain, who has hardly any support in national polls. Is there, nevertheless, a logic to the campaign? Come see what Professor Buchler, a specialist in elections, has to say.

Very best regards,
Joe White
Luxenberg Family Professor of Public Policy and Director, Center for Policy Studies

About Our Guest…

Justin Buchler studies elections, with an emphasis on legislative elections. He has written extensively about the effects of competitive elections on political institutions. His recently published book, Hiring and Firing Public Officials: Rethinking the Purpose of Elections (Oxford University Press), argues that we should think of elections as employment decisions rather than as markets. Thus, competitive elections do not indicate a healthy democracy, as market analogies suggest. Instead, they indicate a failure of democracy because competitive elections are a poor method of making employment decisions regarding public officials. Consequently, they create perverse incentives and unrepresentative outcomes. His published papers on the topic include “The Social Sub-Optimality of Competitive Elections” (in Public Choice), which received the 2007 Gordon Tullock Prize. His other papers on the topic focus on redistricting.

Currently, Justin Buchler writes about the use of spatial models to study elections. His papers address the role of party influence on candidate position-taking, as well as the impact of valence characteristics, such as competence and honesty.

In the past, he has also written about campaign finance, and published several pieces on voting technology.

Where We Meet

The Friday Public Affairs Lunch will meet this week in the Research Commons area on the second floor of Kelvin Smith Library. That is in the northwest corner of the library. When you get off the elevator it would be ahead and to the right – the equivalent of 1 o’clock if the elevator were at 6 o’clock. We should return the following week to the Dampeer Room.

Parking Possibilities

The most convenient parking is the lot underneath Severance Hall. We regret that it is not free. From that lot there is an elevator up to street level (labeled as for the Thwing Center); it is less than 50 yards from that exit to the library entrance. There is also on-street parking on both East Drive and Bellflower. Both are fairly short walks from the library.

Friday Lunch Upcoming Topics and Speakers:

October 21: What Can We Do With Vacant Land in Shrinking Cities?  W. Dennis Keating, Levin College Distinguished Professor, Cleveland State University

October 28: Should the Workday Include Time for Naps? Research Concerning Sleep and Productivity. Elizabeth Click, Assistant Professor, Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing.

November 4: (Re)Regulating Financial Services: How Laws May Work in Practice.  Michael Wager J.D., Squire, Sanders and Dempsey

November 11: How are Successful Companies and Successful Universities Alike?  Richard E. Boyatzis, Distinguished University Professor and H. R. Horvitz Chair of Family Business, Departments of Organizational Behavior, Psychology, and Cognitive Science.

November 18: Wikipedia in the University.  Peter Shulman, Assistant Professor of History.

November 25: No Session – Thanksgiving Break

December 2: University Circle Update. Steven Litt, Architecture Critic, Cleveland Plain Dealer

December 9: Outsourcing and Offshoring Legal Services.  Cassandra Burke Robertson, Associate Professor of Law