Most research on two-party elections has considered the outcome as a single, dichotomous event: either one or the other party wins. In this groundbreaking book, James Fowler and Oleg Smirnov investigate not just who wins, but by how much, and they marshal compelling evidence that mandates-in the form of margin of victory-matter. Using theoretical models, computer simulation, carefully designed experiments, and empirical data, the authors show that after an election the policy positions of both parties move in the direction preferred by the winning party-and they move even more if the victory is large. In addition, Fowler and Smirnov not only show that the divergence between the policy positions of the parties is greatest when the previous election was close, but also that policy positions are further influenced by electoral volatility and ideological polarization.

This pioneering book will be of particular interest to political scientists, game theoreticians, and other scholars who study voting behavior and its short-term and long-range effects on public policy.

Presidents have claimed popular mandates for more than 150 years. How can they make such claims when surveys show that voters are uninformed about the issues? In this groundbreaking book, Patricia Conley argues that mandates are not mere statements of fact about the preferences of voters. By examining election outcomes from the politicians' viewpoint, Conley uncovers the inferences and strategies—the politics—that translate those outcomes into the national policy agenda.

Presidents claim mandates, Conley shows, only when they can mobilize voters and members of Congress to make a major policy change: the margin of victory, the voting behavior of specific groups, and the composition of Congress all affect their decisions. Using data on elections since 1828 and case studies from Truman to Clinton, she demonstrates that it is possible to accurately predict which presidents will ask for major policy changes at the start of their term. Ultimately, she provides a new understanding of the concept of mandates by changing how we think about the relationship between elections and policy-making.