Why Americans Don't Vote

Why Americans Don't Vote

Author: Frances Fox Piven

Publisher: New York : Pantheon Books

Published: 1988

Total Pages: 325

ISBN-13: 9780394755496

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Examines personal voter registration, describes its supporters, and what is needed to maintain an active electorate.


Why Americans Still Don't Vote

Why Americans Still Don't Vote

Author: Frances Fox Piven

Publisher: Beacon Press

Published: 2000-09-22

Total Pages: 364

ISBN-13: 9780807004494

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Americans take for granted that ours is the very model of a democracy. At the core of this belief is the assumption that the right to vote is firmly established. But in fact, the United States is the only major democratic nation in which the less well-off, the young, and minorities are substantially underrepresented in the electorate. Frances Fox Piven and Richard A. Cloward were key players in the long battle to reform voter registration laws that finally resulted in the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (also known as the Motor Voter law). When Why Americans Don't Vote was first published in 1988, this battle was still raging, and their book was a fiery salvo. It demonstrated that the twentieth century had witnessed a concerted effort to restrict voting by immigrants and blacks through a combination of poll taxes, literacy tests, and unwieldy voter registration requirements. Why Americans Still Don't Vote brings the story up to the present. Analyzing the results of voter registration reform, and drawing compelling historical parallels, Piven and Cloward reveal why neither of the major parties has tried to appeal to the interests of the newly registered-and thus why Americans still don't vote.


Making Young Voters

Making Young Voters

Author: John B. Holbein

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2020-02-20

Total Pages: 283

ISBN-13: 1108488420

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The solution to youth voter turnout requires focus on helping young people follow through on their political interests and intentions.


Who Votes Now?

Who Votes Now?

Author: Jan E. Leighley

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2013-11-24

Total Pages: 231

ISBN-13: 1400848628

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Who Votes Now? compares the demographic characteristics and political views of voters and nonvoters in American presidential elections since 1972 and examines how electoral reforms and the choices offered by candidates influence voter turnout. Drawing on a wealth of data from the U.S. Census Bureau's Current Population Survey and the American National Election Studies, Jan Leighley and Jonathan Nagler demonstrate that the rich have consistently voted more than the poor for the past four decades, and that voters are substantially more conservative in their economic views than nonvoters. They find that women are now more likely to vote than men, that the gap in voting rates between blacks and whites has largely disappeared, and that older Americans continue to vote more than younger Americans. Leighley and Nagler also show how electoral reforms such as Election Day voter registration and absentee voting have boosted voter turnout, and how turnout would also rise if parties offered more distinct choices. Providing the most systematic analysis available of modern voter turnout, Who Votes Now? reveals that persistent class bias in turnout has enduring political consequences, and that it really does matter who votes and who doesn't.


Forgotten Americans

Forgotten Americans

Author: Isabel Sawhill

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2018-09-25

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 0300241062

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A sobering account of a disenfranchised American working class and important policy solutions to the nation’s economic inequalities One of the country’s leading scholars on economics and social policy, Isabel Sawhill addresses the enormous divisions in American society—economic, cultural, and political—and what might be done to bridge them. Widening inequality and the loss of jobs to trade and technology has left a significant portion of the American workforce disenfranchised and skeptical of governments and corporations alike. And yet both have a role to play in improving the country for all. Sawhill argues for a policy agenda based on mainstream values, such as family, education, and work. While many have lost faith in government programs designed to help them, there are still trusted institutions on both the local and federal level that can deliver better job opportunities and higher wages to those who have been left behind. At the same time, the private sector needs to reexamine how it trains and rewards employees. This book provides a clear-headed and middle-way path to a better-functioning society in which personal responsibility is honored and inclusive capitalism and more broadly shared growth are once more the norm.


Why Don't Americans Vote?

Why Don't Americans Vote?

Author: Bridgett A. King

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2016-07-11

Total Pages: 327

ISBN-13:

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This timely book provides a thought-provoking discussion of issues that influence voter registration and turnout in contemporary America. Elections not only determine who will fill an office; they have a lot to say about how the democratic process works—or doesn't work—in 21st-century America. This fascinating book sheds light on that question by focusing on factors that currently shape elections and political participation in the United States. It covers issues that are consistently in the media, such as gerrymandering; voter ID; and rules pertaining to when, where, and how Americans register and vote. But it also goes beyond the obvious to consider issues that are often overlooked—civic education and engagement, citizen apathy, and political alienation, for example. The volume begins with an introduction to elections that includes a discussion of the history of voting in the United States. Each subsequent chapter covers a different topic relative to registration and voting. It addresses matters of education as well as socialization, mobilization, and the legal and political structures that shape U.S. political participation. Ideal for readers who may be considering such concerns for the first time, the work will foster an understanding of why political participation is important and of the causes and consequences of non-voting.


Why Americans Don't Vote

Why Americans Don't Vote

Author: Frances Fox Piven

Publisher: Pantheon

Published: 1988

Total Pages: 350

ISBN-13:

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Examines personal voter registration, describes its supporters, and what is needed to maintain an active electorate.


Get Out the Vote

Get Out the Vote

Author: Donald P. Green

Publisher: Brookings Institution Press

Published: 2008-09-01

Total Pages: 239

ISBN-13: 081573266X

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The first edition of Get Out the Vote! broke ground by introducing a new scientific approach to the challenge of voter mobilization and profoundly influenced how campaigns operate. In this expanded and updated edition, the authors incorporate data from more than one hundred new studies, which shed new light on the cost-effectiveness and efficiency of various campaign tactics, including door-to-door canvassing, e-mail, direct mail, and telephone calls. Two new chapters focus on the effectiveness of mass media campaigns and events such as candidate forums and Election Day festivals. Available in time for the core of the 2008 presidential campaign, this practical guide on voter mobilization is sure to be an important resource for consultants, candidates, and grassroots organizations. Praise for the first edition: "Donald P. Green and Alan S. Gerber have studied turnout for years. Their findings, based on dozens of controlled experiments done as part of actual campaigns, are summarized in a slim and readable new book called Get Out the Vote!, which is bound to become a bible for politicians and activists of all stripes." —Alan B. Kreuger, in the New York Times "Get Out the Vote! shatters conventional wisdom about GOTV." —Hal Malchow in Campaigns & Elections "Green and Gerber's recent book represents important innovations in the study of turnout."—Political Science Review "Green and Gerber have provided a valuable resource for grassroots campaigns across the spectrum."—National Journal


Dignity

Dignity

Author: Chris Arnade

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2019-06-04

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 0525534733

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NATIONAL BESTSELLER "A profound book.... It will break your heart but also leave you with hope." —J.D. Vance, author of Hillbilly Elegy "[A] deeply empathetic book." —The Economist With stark photo essays and unforgettable true stories, Chris Arnade cuts through "expert" pontification on inequality, addiction, and poverty to allow those who have been left behind to define themselves on their own terms. After abandoning his Wall Street career, Chris Arnade decided to document poverty and addiction in the Bronx. He began interviewing, photographing, and becoming close friends with homeless addicts, and spent hours in drug dens and McDonald's. Then he started driving across America to see how the rest of the country compared. He found the same types of stories everywhere, across lines of race, ethnicity, religion, and geography. The people he got to know, from Alabama and California to Maine and Nevada, gave Arnade a new respect for the dignity and resilience of what he calls America's Back Row--those who lack the credentials and advantages of the so-called meritocratic upper class. The strivers in the Front Row, with their advanced degrees and upward mobility, see the Back Row's values as worthless. They scorn anyone who stays in a dying town or city as foolish, and mock anyone who clings to religion or tradition as naïve. As Takeesha, a woman in the Bronx, told Arnade, she wants to be seen she sees herself: "a prostitute, a mother of six, and a child of God." This book is his attempt to help the rest of us truly see, hear, and respect millions of people who've been left behind.


The Vanishing Voter

The Vanishing Voter

Author: Thomas E. Patterson

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2009-09-09

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 0307548678

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From the award-winning author of Out of Order—named the best political science book of the last decade by the American Political Science Association—comes this landmark book about why Americans don’t vote. Based on more than 80,000 interviews, The Vanishing Voter investigates why—despite a better educated citizenry, the end of racial barriers to voting, and simplified voter registration procedures—the percentage of voters has steadily decreased to the point that the United States now has nearly the lowest voting rate in the world. Patterson cites the blurring of differences between the political parties, the news media’s negative bias, and flaws in the election system to explain this disturbing trend while suggesting specific reforms intended to bring Americans back to the polls. Astute, far-reaching, and impeccably researched, The Vanishing Voter engages the very meaning of our relationship to our government.