Anthony Malky, Catie Davis, Michael Herman, Sarah HuffmanPSCI 207Professor Bos 30 July 2016

Location, Location, Location: The Connection Between National Party Convention

Location and Party Benefits

Literature Review

Many studies have noted that the Democratic Party receives more electoral

benefits from the Democratic National Convention (DNC) than Republicans enjoy from

the Republican National Convention (RNC). One area of research that needs further

study, as will be shown, can be supplemented through research of the following question,

why does the Democratic Party receive a greater bump from its National Convention

than the GOP? Our particular research question seeks to further understand why there is

a difference between parties and hopes to uncover answers through surveys of the local

population. First we will analyze the debate about whether or not the strategic location of

national conventions affect election results and then we will note the variances in results

and methodology regarding convention bumps, media attention, and the demographics of

mobilized voters.  

Overall, the literature is unable to agree whether the strategic location of a party’s

National Convention produces electoral benefits. Powell (2004) notes that voters seem to

be relatively fixed regarding vote choice, an outcome of party identification and social

and demographic characteristics, leaving little room to be influenced by campaigns and a

National Convention (Powell 2004, 120). The very fact that conventions are held towards

the end of the nominating season weakens their impact on the electorate, most voters

have already made up their mind by the time the DNC or RNC is held. Furthermore, as

regional differences in public opinion and voting have diminished over time, conventions

have shown to have less of an impact on host states (Powell 2004, 121). Moreover,

Powell discovered that parties received no electoral boost from states where the

convention was held between 1932 and 2000 and that the site selection process is

irrelevant from support within a state hosting the convention (Powell 2004, 121). A

critique of the study is that the conclusions are drawn without further examination:

Powell concludes that National Convention location does not have an impact; however,

the state level effects are all that is observed. In order to properly refute conventional

wisdom of the impact of strategic convention location, multiple units of analysis, such as

demographics and resource allocation, are necessary. Specific demographics, such as low

resource voters, may help to explain the difference in benefits each party receives from

their convention.

On the contrary, Atkinson, et al. found that the strategic location of a National

Convention is significant and creates electoral benefits for the host party. This

discrepancy lies in the units of analysis as Powell examined states as a whole and the

effects of a National Convention on the host state, while Atkinson et al took a closer look

of the effects at the city and county level on specific designated media markets (DMAs).

This study was interested in populations that reside within the DMAs. The latter surmised

there is no reason to expect that the heightened information flow from a convention

within a local area would extend throughout the entire state. Multiple and differing media

markets limit the ability for the effects of a National Convention to spread across an

entire state (Atkinson et al., 2014, 1046). Thus, they argue that campaigns target toss-up

counties or cities as opposed to swing states when strategically choosing their location

(Atkinson et al., 2014, 1046). In accordance with Powell’s theory, convention location

does not have an impact on the host state, but locally, within the host city or county:

location matters.

The effects and benefits parties enjoy from the strategic location of their National

Convention can be a result of the media. Media coverage and the media markets are

important; people within the local area of a convention are overloaded with convention

and election coverage. The frenzy of media attention around a local area and its voters

receive from hosting a convention opens the door for parties to turn voters into supporters

and increases the importance of convention location. Fine provides the historical

narrative for how the haves and the have-nots have debated convention rules to tip the

scales in their favor. However, Atkinson et al. fails to acknowledge the way in which

media coverage coincides with the National Conventions. The literature simply notes the

impact without taking into account the ways in which the media could influence the

results of the study.

Again, the literature agrees on one aspect: the Democratic Party receives more

benefits from convention location than the GOP. While there are local advantages for

strategically choosing the National Convention site for both parties, Democrats enjoy

greater electoral boots. Powell demonstrates that Democrats have the upper hand when it

comes to home-state advantage, meaning Democratic candidates showcased in their

home state receive more of a boost than Republicans in their home state.  Of the

nominees showcased at a convention as home-state advantage for Democrats produced a

7.4% vote increase, opposed to just .4% for the GOP (Powell 2004, 127). Therefore, if

the DNC is held in the home state of one of its candidates, the party is likely to enjoy an

increase in support. There is no evidence provided for why the party enjoys such an

advantage. Although Powell rejects the overall impact of conventions, he does

acknowledge that Democrats fared better than Republicans when it comes to an electoral

boost from the state hosting a convention. Democrats experienced a 1.8% increase in

votes within the state the convention was held, Republicans, just .3% (Powell 2004, 127).

The attraction of voters and conversion of the opposition is largely responsible for

the electoral benefits the Democratic Party enjoys as a product of the DNC. Atkinson et

al. finds that in Democratic counties within the convention’s media market, there is a

large increase in support for the Democratic nominee of up to seven percentage points

from being exposed to the DNC (Atkinson et al., 2014, 1050). Also, within the DNC, the

Democratic Party has the ability to persuade or flip voters who are in slightly Republican

areas. Therefore, the location of the Democratic convention is significant as the party can

rally not only staunch supporters, but also voters from the opposing party. Highlighting

even further the exposure effect being stronger to the DNC for local areas exposed or

hosting it; for those not already supporting the Democratic candidate, being exposed to

the convention increased their chance of support by around 6% (Atkinson et al., 2014,

1053). For the GOP, exposure to the RNC actually decreases the chances of support

within the locale. Although Democrats are actually able to gain votes within the area

hosting the DNC, the GOP is not able to do the same with the RNC. The patterns are

consistent within the literature; local exposure to the DNC for people in the host area

moves a broad range of voters towards supporting the Democratic candidates and in turn

creates an electoral boost for the party.

Other scholars have also focused on media coverage and its significant effects on

voter mobilization and interest in a particular election. In chapter two of Rewiring

Politics, Panagopoulos discusses the impact of the campaign bump on the DNC and

RNC. They discovered that there has been a decrease in election coverage in the

traditional media between 1964 and 2004. They also found that convention bumps for the

Democratic Party have varied more in size, meaning that it is dependent on the

convention and candidate while the RNC is less varied. They discover that Democratic

voters care more about the convention, which can be presumed to be a result of the

excitement from the media and the candidates; this has conflicting results with other

studies. Another article, The Impact of Television Market Size on Voter Turnout in

American Elections notes that the size of local television markets affects the amount of

political election coverage, which will in turn affect the voter turnout rate. Oddly, they

found that the size of the television market is indirectly related to the voter turnout rate,

which is unexpected. This means the larger the television market does not necessarily

mean more voters tend to turn out in their area. They test their argument by examining

four election cycles between 1984 and 1990, and looking at aggregate voting data in

nearly every sub-county in the continental United States. The author notes that their

research could be supplemented by further research on variance in rural, urban, and

suburban communities and how this affects voter turnout, which could be included within

our future study and this demographic effect.

Panagopoulos (2007, 19-22) claims that the amount of convention coverage and

viewership for both conventions in traditional media has declined. However, the 24-hour

news cycle has devised a culture where people have greater access to coverage than ever

before due to innovations in media. The rise of social media content surrounding politics

could also attribute to the decline in viewership and coverage. In terms of location, the

lack of traditional media coverage could alter how people are excited by the election

within their community.  While Panagopoulos fails to recognize specifically who is being

affected by the convention bump in each party, another study, Battleground States versus

Blackout States: the Behavioral Implications of Modern Presidential Campaigns focuses

on a campaign’s ability to mobilize low resource voters such as minorities, the lesser

educated, or lower income citizens through an analysis of American National Election

Studies for the 2000 and 2004 elections. They examined the effects of political

involvement in contested states where both political parties directed a large number of

their resources. This study discovered that political interest levels for low-income voters

in contested states did increase. However, in some instances, likely due to lower levels of

party contact resource voters received less party contact with 13% higher contact for

battleground states in 2000 and 36% in 2004 (Gimpel et. al. 2007,791).  Finally, the study

did find a slightly increased likelihood of political involvement in contested areas for

low-income voters in its 2004 study, while controlling for contact levels. This study will

contribute to our question when we seek to understand whom each national convention

appeals to in contact levels, and how this might affect the interest levels and involvement

of the local population. Interestingly, this particular study found that contested states do

not increase voter involvement for the affluent, “but the interaction of battleground status

and low-income, notably enhances the engagement of the have-nots” (Gimpel et. al.

2007, 792). Another way people are engaging with their political environment is through

the use of mass media. Fine (2007, 166) claims that mass media allow citizens to interact

with elites during political events where traditionally they are closed to the public.

Further research could examine why Democrats received more electoral benefits

from the strategic location of their National Conventions as well as the factors causing

the difference in boosts for both parties regarding convention sites. Additionally, the

literature displays the impact the media has on influencing voters and the ability for

parties to mobilize support; therefore, the media’s role should be further investigated in

order to best understand the electoral benefits. It is possible that the effects of a National

Convention on a local area are the products of the media and its work, as opposed to the

conventions themselves or the respective parties or campaigns. Also, further investigation

is necessary in determining whether or not mass media integrates the three merits of

democratic theory:  accessibility of leadership, voter goals, and participation (Fine 167,

2007).

Our future study will provide an updated understanding of these factors, as many

of these studies are not recent enough to keep up with technological advancements. We

also hope to synthesize the various elements of these studies to understand the disparity

in effectiveness between the DNC and the RNC, applying the findings from Battleground

states versus blackout states: The behavioral implications of modern presidential

campaigns more specifically to conventions. The study analyzed political interest and

involvement of lower resource voters geographically, but did not compare data between

party lines. If we were to study and determine if there is a major gap between parties, it

appears likely the differing demographic mobilization within lower resource voters could

explain the greater variance in the DNC bumps and the greater effectiveness of their

campaigns found in studies by Powell et al. and Panagopoulos.  

Methodology

The effectiveness of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) and the

Republican National Convention (RNC) in mobilizing voter turnout regionally is largely

debated. Our question seeks to answer why does the Democratic Party receive a greater

bump from its National Convention than the GOP?  Based off of previous scholarship

which has found that political parties are more likely to contact more educated, wealthier,

and older individuals (Gershtenson 2003), we hypothesize the following:  The

Democratic Party and the Democratic National Convention targets more lower resource

voters than the Republican Party and Republican National Convention. Thus, we should

see more of a bump generated by the DNC than the RNC from reaching out to this often-

untapped group. By targeting we mean reaching out to this demographic; through

mailers, face to face contact, phone calls, email, or any way in which the party/candidates

tries to get into contact or direct their message to low resource voters. We will be

surveying voters within each convention city, Cleveland and Philadelphia, hosting the

RNC and DNC respectively, in order to collect our data. The goal of our research is to

determine why the Democratic Party receives a greater bump from its National

Convention than the GOP.  More specifically, our study hopes to reveal that the

Democratic Party and DNC contacts low resource voters at a higher rate than the RNC.

The increased contact of low resource voters in contested areas should increase their

political engagement and excitability (Gimpel et al. 2007), leading them to support the

Democratic Party nominee and providing a greater bump. Conducting survey research is

the best choice of methodology in order to compare differences in demographic contact

and mobilization between the two party conventions.

The idea of the “bump” following a National Party Convention is essential to our

study. Panagopoulos (2007) defines the “bump” that tends to follow each convention as

the increase in support that a candidate typically receives at the conclusion of the party’s

convention. Holbrook supports the claim that voters who are more exposed to campaign

rhetoric on behalf of the candidate are more likely to support the candidate.  For our

research, we will define low resource voters as, “individuals who have a high cost entry

to voting due to social, political, or economic inhibitors and thus are less likely to vote in

the general election.” Matsusaka (2001, 415) claims that in order to become a habitual

voter an individual has to overcome the high cost of entry into political participation.

These individuals are often from low income and younger voters who are disenfranchised

by the democratic process. Plutzer (2002, 42) claims that, “As young citizens confront

their first election: all the costs of voting are magnified.”  We hope to find that low

resource voters who reside in the metropolitan area of a national convention are more

likely to become involved in the democratic process. For the purpose of our study,

demographic factors that we will observe for low resource voters include younger, lesser-

educated, low-income, and racial minority citizens.  If an individual is below thirty, did

not receive a college degree, has an income of below $25,000, or if they are another

ethnicity besides white then they have factors towards low resource voting.  Each of the

aspects of “low resource” will be operationalized through questions in our survey:  we

will ask voters questions about their age, education, income, and race through clearly

demarcated groups.  For the purposes of this survey, if an individual has two or more

“low resource” traits, then they will be defined as a low resource voter.  This measure is

valid in that the variables we will control, directly measure “low resource” voters as we

define them.

This will create an observational, mixed study, because we are not directly

manipulating the environment or changing the independent variables across participants.

Due to our choice of survey methodology, voter’s responses to our questions will

measured both qualitatively and quantitatively. Our independent variable will be low

resource voter contact while political engagement is our dependent variable. In low

resource voter contact, we are talking about contact from the campaigns or parties

themselves. Both campaigns and parties contact voters through face-to-face contact,

emails, phone calls, social media and print. Our aim is to measure this contact by asking

voters questions like, “Has your political party contacted you within the last six months?”

We define political engagement as, “The interactions of citizens with their society and

their government.”  For the purpose of this study we will be operationally measuring both

political contact and political engagement levels by asking questions regarding electoral

indicators and indicators of political voice (Hill and Leighley 1996). These types of

questions will increase the validity of this measure by illustrating the political contact and

political engagement of the respondents. However, the reliability of measuring political

engagement may come into question when considering the variation in voters’ self

reported responses.

Our cases for this study will be the two National Party conventions: the DNC in

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and the RNC in Cleveland, Ohio. Within each of the two

cases we will be conducting a random sample of voters located in each convention area

for the duration of the event. Voters for our purpose are those of voting age, eighteen and

older, and those who are registered or may register. We intend for our sample to be

representative of the voting population who reside within the local media market of the

convention site. Our sample will be determined by the amount of people who agree to

respond to our survey. Our analytic technique will utilize both Quick Response (QR)

codes and paper surveys. We will distribute both to the public within the area of each

convention site.  QR codes are useful in that they are accessible to a wide range of people

with smartphones who are not in the immediate convention location.  However, the use of

QR codes may be difficult for some low resource voters who may not have access to a

smartphone and thus will be more likely to respond to the paper surveys.

We intend to handout QR codes in high traffic areas around the convention site.

People will then be able to take a picture on their smartphone, which would then direct

them to our survey. We will also conduct surveys in person in close proximity to the

convention by developing an unbiased system: we will ask every third person we see in

public. Paper surveys may be more accessible to lower resource voters, but it will limit

our ability to interact with a wider range of participants because we will be confined to

the immediate convention location area. In order to remove bias and to conduct our

survey in the most random way possible, for paper surveys we will approach every third

person on the street and ask them to complete the survey. In this case, we will survey

every third person at the establishment. We have no control regarding those who respond

via the QR codes that we will post, therefore this removes a majority of the bias involved

with the technique. Ultimately, paper surveys, which we will conduct in person will be

our primary method of data collection.

Within our survey we will embed a “pre-test”. The pretest will be conducted by

asking questions at the beginning of the survey that will allow us to observe pre-

convention levels of each measure in order to compare the results to the responses

regarding post-convention levels of each measure. In addition, this part of the survey will

allow us to gain information about the respondent, including the demographic they fall

under, which is essential to our study. Survey responses for each measure will vary. For

example, depending on the type of question regarding income level, the responses may be

either interval or ratio. We may ask the voter to report their income in number form, or

we could ask them to select a range in which their income falls under. The level of

measurement we employ will be dependent on the type of question that we ask. We are

certain our questions will seek to measure the variables we are concerned with, contact of

low resource voters and political engagement. After conducting our surveys, we will

analyze our data and determine if there is a statistically significant relationship between

political party contact and political engagement, with a focus on comparing contact levels

by each of the parties towards certain demographics of voters.  We will also analyze our

data and attempt to make the samples between the two conventions as close as possible

demographically so that our data can be compared. Finally, we hope to be able to depict

on a map the places from which our respondents reside, their level of political

engagement and contact they received from the parties or candidates. After plotting our

respondents on a map of each convention city we will be able to easily compare.

Particular strengths with using an observational survey include a greater level of

internal validity, which will allow us to determine the direct causal relationship in a more

controlled environment where we can test for any possible spurious factors. Another

strength is its feasibility of methods. We can easily gain participation from the local

population, rather than individuals who are more difficult to contact and there are little

obstacles to the completion of our study. One weakness is that our sample we collect

might not be representative of the populations of Cleveland or Philadelphia, or it might

be more difficult to receive survey data from low resource voters such as the Spanish-

speaking population. A specific concern is that the National Conventions are likely to

draw in the party elite and those more politically excitable; thus, our survey sample size

may run small and reduce our validity.

In order to find evidence for our proposed relationship, we hope to see an increase

in contact of low resource voters by the two parties. More specifically, we expect to find

the Democratic Party and the DNC reach out and target low resource voters substantially

more than the Republican Party and the RNC. In order gain feedback from a substantial

amount of low resource voters, we are considering surveying in an area with a high

density of these types of voters. For instance, we may survey at a community center or a

local food bank. In addition we plan to survey people at various protests and rallies where

“low resource voters” may be common. Further, our proposed theory suggests that as

these low resource voters are mobilized, they will experience more political or

convention related content in their lives. Therefore, if we were to observe that these low

resource voters had experienced an increase in political or convention coverage through

their local news outlets or if their social media content had become more politically

focused, thus our proposed relationship would be confirmed. In addition, the increase in

contact of low resource voters should increase their political engagement. In order to see

the proposed increase in political engagement we would hope to observe low resource

voters who begin to support the Democratic candidate or candidates, whereas they may

not have done so before receiving increased contact from the party or convention. We

expect the increase in political engagement of low resource voters to be the source of the

bump created by the Democratic Party and DNC. In conclusion, our proposed

relationships should develop within the conditions and locale of the DNC, but not

necessarily within the RNC.  We suggest the possibility that the RNC does not target as

many low resource voters and thus will not receive as significant of a bump post-

convention.

Results and Data Analysis

Overall, 92 people completed our survey between the two cities and convention

locations. There were 45 respondents for the survey conducted near the RNC in

Cleveland. 47% of the respondents in Cleveland were low resource voters and 44% of

them had a local Cleveland zip code. In total, 47% of respondents were contacted by their

political party within 30 days of the RNC, while of the low resource voters only 42%

were contacted by their political party, which is a slightly lower percentage. However,

when looking at low resource Democratic voters a staggering 85.7% of them were

contacted by the Democratic party which is a substantially higher percentage.  According

to the results, only 4% of respondents supported Donald Trump, the Republican nominee;

however, our survey only gathered five Republicans in the Cleveland area which could

help explain this lower percentage. There was a huge increase in engagement levels for

low resource voters, with 95% reporting an increase in their political engagement within

the thirty days around the convention. Within Cleveland, 52% of low resource voters

were local to the convention area and none of these low resource voters were Republican.

During the time of the DNC in Philadelphia there were 47 respondents to our

survey.  There was a higher number of low resource voters in Philadelphia, with 72.3% of

those surveyed falling into this category, 72.3% of respondents resided in a local

Philadelphia zip code within the immediate DNC area. In total, 62% of respondents

reported being contacted by their political party within 30 days of the convention. 59% of

low resource voters were contacted by their political party, which is a marginally lower

rate. However, 75% of local low resource Democratic voters, our group of interest,

identified that they were contacted by the Democratic party. This is a higher rate of

contact than average voters of other political parties receive, including the Republican

party. 58% of low resource voters noted an increase in their engagement level once the

convention was underway in the area. Within Philadelphia, 82.3% of low resource voters

were local to the convention area and of these voters 64.2% were Democrats. Overall,

83% of local low resource Democratic voters supported the Democratic nominee, Hillary

Clinton. The effort by the Democratic Party to target low resource voters in the DNC area

of Philadelphia was substantial.

While in the Cleveland area 91% of respondents identified themselves as being at

least rarely engaged, overall individuals identified themselves to be more engaged in the

Philadelphia area with 66% of respondents identifying as ‘engaged a lot’ or ‘engaged a

great deal.’ One problematic aspect of our survey was that the randomized survey

collection gathered far more Democrats than it did Republicans. We gathered 92

responses but only 10 were Republicans. The sample demographics in Philadelphia were

as expected with a good number of low resource Democrats near the DNC area who

reported high levels of contact. However, in Cleveland there were no low resource

Republican voters, causing insufficient data to analyze how the Republican party

responds to its low resource constituents.

This signifies that the Democratic party actively targeted low resource voters in

the local Democratic National Convention area. We can make few conclusions about the

Republican party contact levels towards lower resource voters based on the limited data

and incongruencies in the demographics between the two cities. Since we found no low

resource Republican voters in the RNC area we cannot draw any conclusions regarding

this group in respect to the RNC or GOP. Our data was collected randomly yet we tried to

speak with low resource voters. Seeing that the majority of our low resource respondents

were Democrats it may be the case that low resource voters tend to affiliate mostly with

the Democratic party or as Independents, as opposed to Republican.

Conclusion

In seeking to understand the question why does the Democratic Party receive a

greater bump from its National Convention than the GOP? The first part of our

hypothesis that the Democratic Party and the Democratic National Convention targets

more lower resource voters than the Republican Party and Republican National

Convention cannot be upheld because there are not enough low resource Republican

voters to draw a conlcusion.  However, we did find that the Democratic Party more

effectively contacted low resource voters who were Democrats, and that low resource

voters who were independent or of a third party were not contacted to the same degree.

The second part of our hypothesis, that we should see more of a bump generated by the

DNC than the RNC from reaching out to this often-untapped group, was upheld in that

the Democrats sufficiently targeted low resource voters, especially low resource members

of the Democratic Party within the DNC area. The efforts of the Democratic Party to

target low resource voters were successful in exciting the demographic towards being

more politically engaged. The increase in political engagement among the low resource

voters moved a majority of the demographic to support the Democratic nominee, Hillary

Clinton and thus providing the “bump” we expected to see. Our results also show us that

the Democratic Party is making an effort to reach across the aisle and contact voters who

are not members of the Democratic Party. This is as expected, since conventional wisdom

tells us that the Democratic Party and the DNC has the ability to attract voters from the

other side or voters outside of its party in a way that the GOP does not.

Studies of convention location and its connection to party benefits are worthy of

further research.  Future projects could incorporate larger sample sizes and also make a

greater effort to survey Republican voters to determine if low resource Republican voters

are contacted in future convention cities.  If there is a reasonable balance between parties

of the survey respondents it makes for the ability to draw further conclusions. Future

studies could also measure more than two convention cities across multiple election years

to determine trends over time and to control for any circumstantial anomalies.  In

addition, if a convention is hosted in a city that has hosted a different party’s convention

in a previous year, the impact of the two conventions could be compared.  It will be

interesting to compare the results of our research to the final effects of each convention

on the 2016 Presidential election.

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