Political campaign

As the direct election canvassed parties or candidates for votes before an election is called in the strict sense. In a broader sense, the largest part of the behavior of parties or candidates before an election can be attributed to the campaign. In Germany it is called permanent election campaign, when very often take place in one of the states elections and thus the tangible policy is paralyzed. A scientific debate takes place especially with the individual choice behavior of citizens as well as the special communication of the parties during the election campaign. Campaign is now often take the form of campaigns.

• 3.1 Personal messages
• 3.2 Thematic messages
• 3.3 party -related messages

Function

The campaign primarily serves two functions. Firstly, it is intended to motivate the supporters of a party again, on the other hand, it should serve to move the undecided voters to vote. As the traditional bond decreases to political parties, the election campaign is becoming increasingly important.

History and forms

• Direct election campaign: forms and means of direct election campaign in particular public speaking, information stands in public places and in pedestrian zones or personal speeches of citizens by the candidates by so-called " door to door ". The still widespread in the 1980s communication of ( short ) texts from the speakers of a moving car in a residential area is hardly in use; questionable is the effect of the distribution of small gifts ( pens, stickers, balloons, etc.) primarily to ( without voting rights ) children.

• Traditional mass media: The indirect forms of campaigning techniques are known, use the mass media. These include electoral programs, leaflets, election posters, newspapers and election campaign hit.

• Electronic Mass Media: Particularly the electronic mass media have changed the election campaign. In recent years, a change in election campaigns is observed. While the traditional election, especially in Germany, was operated by ordinary party members and focused on the advertising site, increases the importance of the mass media. At the same time it is stated that the election campaign is increasingly professionalized, that is supervised by professional advertising agencies, and is limited in terms of personalization on single top candidates (see also Americanization ). As exemplary examples of the election campaign of Bill Clinton in 1992, or called by Tony Blair 1997. In Germany, who was in charge of the campaign headquarters Kampa election campaign the SPD was called before the federal election of 1998 as a significant change in the election campaigns. It was the first rallies with infotainment, presenters such as Frank Buschmann, Holger Pfandt or Peter Kunz, panel discussions and musical acts. To what extent these trends really take place, and how they change the voting behavior, is highly controversial in the political science literature. Election campaign takes since then with commercials and televised debates (including TV duels ), on the radio and on the Internet instead. In Germany, for private and public- service broadcasters special legal regime for campaign spots. More or less subtle influence exercised there is "behind the scenes " by so-called spin doctors.

Election on the internet

Internet campaign called the implementing or monitoring of election campaigns taking advantage of the special capabilities of the Internet. This includes the address of voters, volunteers, donors and multipliers, for example via e- mail newsletters, websites or blogs.

Internet campaign can do better in the communication of an election campaign certain tasks than others. The self-selection process in the Internet example, makes it very difficult to reach voters who are not interested in politics. For while these voters would for example not dodge a 30 - second TV spot, they would have to the Internet specifically seek out the information provided by the campaign, or to subscribe to the newsletter. Election on the internet has to orientate in target groups, which can be achieved particularly well on the Internet:

The Internet makes it easier to integrate the political base in the election campaign. Some campaigns instead of following the traditional top -down approach of campaigning even a strong bottom- up approach. This was particularly pronounced in the campaign of Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean in the primaries 2003/2004. Similar to a grassroots movement, the Dean campaign was shaped and controlled the content of the political base and also financed primarily by means of many small individual donations. The Dean campaign was about her campaign blog always in an intensive dialogue with the political base and elaborated on ideas from the user comments. As part of this campaign, the term open source was first introduced in the campaign context.

Howard Dean was able to mobilize a large number of volunteers over the Internet and take the record sum of 15 million U.S. dollars in donations in three months. The campaign of Howard Dean became the model for the modern Internet campaign. During the internet campaign has already gained a lot of importance in the United States, its potential has not yet been fully exploited in Germany in the federal election campaigns in 2005 and 2009.

See also: Twitter # election campaign in Germany, dial Blog

Types of campaign messages

Personal messages

Personal campaign messages put onto the top staff of the party and especially the future officers. This focus reduces the complexity of issues and institutional decisions on a person. The political scientist Werner Wolf put it in 1980 as the top candidate in the election campaign embodies the programs, goals and interests of his party. He makes the policy for the citizens understand. In Germany, this is especially noticeable on the role played by the chancellor candidate in the election campaign, similar processes can be observed for a premiership but also at the top candidates of smaller parties or candidates.

Topic-related messages

The thematic campaign messages are particularly aimed at the policies by which a party or a candidate seeking to position themselves positively. The fields are selected according to the criteria of whether they are perceived in the electorate as particularly problematic or particularly important and whether a candidate or party in the population enjoys a particularly high level of competence attribution in it. When a topic is considered in the population as important, it is for the parties particularly important to this topic to interpret so that it acts like a subject in which the party is regarded as particularly competent. A classic example of the federal policy would be the unemployment problem, which would be interpreted by black and yellow as a policy issue, but primarily because the parties were of the SPD a social issue here as especially competent. In the federal election campaign in 1998 but succeeded in the SPD to regard the issue as a policy issue and still win the election.

Party related messages

Related party campaign messages refer to the party as a whole and to the image that tries to shape this during the election campaign itself. For the parties it comes to a point is to be considered as particularly competent, on the other hand an important ideological positioning takes place here. Are known here in Germany for example, the Freedom Not Socialism campaign the CDU at times Adenauer, the security in the future campaign of the CDU in the federal election in 1994, when it succeeded, with the help of the Red Sox, the SPD imaginary in a to put the Left Front, or the We - are - ready - campaign the SPD in the 1998 national elections. According to the model of the median voter in the election campaign parties tend to the center of society.

The timing of choice embassies

Each party must observe other parties in the election campaign and cover both their statements and the corresponding reaction of the majority of voters. This has the consequence that the content and the temporal placement of each election embassy plays a major role. As an alternative to intuitive, based on instinct strategies, including mathematical and strategic methods are now used. In practice, however, each method must be user-friendly and thus sufficiently simple. One based on the odds - strategy and flexible method for finding optimal solutions should be noted as an example.

Election reimbursements

The election campaign expenses is an important part of state funding of political parties. To be included in this, a party must reach 0.5 % of the vote in a national election, or 1 % of the vote in state elections. Where there is no state funding exists, the parties must reach for an effective campaign donations very high sums, for example, in the United States.