Voting at the Political Fault Line

California's adoption of the blanket primary in 1996 presented a unique natural experiment on the impact that election rules have on politics. Billed as a measure that would increase voter participation and end ideological polarization, Proposition 198 placed California voters once again on the frontier of political reform. Employing a variety of data sources and methodologies, the contributors to Voting at the Political Fault Line apply their wide-ranging expertise to understand how this change in political institutions affected electoral behavior and outcomes. This authoritative study analyzes the consequences of California's experiment with the blanket primary, including the incidence of, motivations behind, and persistence of crossover voting; the behavior of candidates and donors; the effects on candidate positions and party platforms; and the consequences for women, minorities, and minor-party candidates.

Published in association with the Institute of Governmental Studies, University of California, Berkeley

Bruce E. Cain is Robson Professor of Political Science, University of California, Berkeley, and Director, Institute of Governmental Studies, University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of The Reapportionment Puzzle (California, 1984) and coauthor of The Personal Vote (1987) and Congressional Redistricting (1992). Elisabeth R. Gerber is Professor of Public Policy and Director of the State and Local Policy Center, Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, University of Michigan. She is the author of The Populist Paradox: Interest Group Influence and the Promise of Direct Legislation (1999) and coauthor of Stealing the Initiative: How State Government Responds to Direct Democracy (2000).

List of Tables
List of Figures

Part One: Introduction and Background
1. California’s Blanket Primary Experiment
Bruce E. Cain and Elisabeth R. Gerber
2. Crossover Voting before the Blanket: Primaries versus Parties in California History
Brian J. Gaines and Wendy K. Tam Cho
3. Political Reform via the Initiative Process: What Voters Think about When They Change the Rules
Shaun Bowler and Todd Donovan
4. Context and Setting: The Mood of the California Electorate
Mark Baldassare

Part Two: Crossover Voting
5. The Causes and Consequences of Crossover Voting in the 1998 California Elections
John Sides, Jonathan Cohen, and Jack Citrin
6. Should I Stay or Should I Go? Sincere and Strategic Crossover Voting in California Assembly Races
R. Michael Alvarez and Jonathan Nagler
7. Peeking Under the Blanket: A Direct Look at Crossover Voting in the 1998 Primary
Anthony M. Salvanto and Martin P. Wattenberg

Part Three: Effects of the Blanket Primary
8. Crossing Over When It Counts: How the Motives of Voters in Blanket Primaries Are Revealed by Their Actions in General Elections
Thad Kousser
9. Candidates, Donors, and Voters in California’s Blanket Primary Elections
Wendy K. Tam Cho and Brian J. Gaines
10. Strategic Voting and Candidate Policy Positions
Elisabeth R. Gerber
11. Openness Begets Opportunity: Minor Parties and California’s Blanket Primary
Christian Collet
12. Thinner Ranks: Women as Candidates and California’s Blanket Primary
Miki Caul and Katherine Tate
13. Targets of Opportunity: California’s Blanket Primary and the Political Representation of Latinos
Gary M. Segura and Nathan D. Woods
14. Candidate Strategy, Voter Response, and Party Cohesion
John R. Petrocik

Part Four: Conclusions and Implications
15. The Blanket Primary in the Courts: The Precedent and Implications of California Democratic Party v. Jones
Nathaniel Persily
16. Strategies and Rules: Lessons from the 2000 Presidential Primary
Bruce E. Cain and Megan Mullin

List of Contributors
Index