Getting Voters Mobilized in California: Some Useful Research Findings

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Jan Adams
Happening Here

Last week I heard political scientists Melissa Michelson (CSU-East Bay), Lisa Garcia Bedolla (UC-Irvine) and Donald Green (Yale) present preliminary findings from their research on which methods used by community organizations among James Irvine Foundation grantees in the California Votes Initiative really worked to increase voter turnout. The research involved doing randomized trials of turnout techniques on low propensity voters using the community groups as campaign labor.

Folks interested in the mechanics of campaigns need to think about these findings through a reality filter -- maximizing turnout is seldom a campaign goal. Campaigns are about maximizing the right turnout, the turnout of voters on our side. (Remember what Karl Rove thought U.S. Attorneys ought to be doing.) Nonetheless, these social science observations can help us think about what we do.

The academics assured the audience that they had not found anything startlingly different from the findings in a previous book by Green and Alan Gerber which I have discussed here. But they brought some nuances and additional certainty about previous findings.

What doesn't work

Since resources are always scarce, this can be the most valuable insight. This project reinforced previous research that direct mail has almost no discernable positive effect on turnout. Considering the amount of money that campaigns spend on it, that's important. Mail may persuade a likely voter to choose your candidate as opposed to someone else, but it won't engage unlikely voters. If winning requires engaging those voters, you'll have to use other forms of contact.