Democratic Disarray: Organizational Messaging Coherence and the Local Echoing Press During the 2020 Iowa Democratic Caucus

2021 ◽  
pp. 000276422110108
Author(s):  
Eric C. Wiemer ◽  
Joshua M. Scacco ◽  
Brenda Berkelaar
Keyword(s):  
Crisis Management ◽  
Political Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Public Communication ◽  
Organizational Crisis ◽  
Party Organization ◽  
Timely Manner ◽  
Presidential Nomination ◽  
Des Moines ◽  
American Elections

The Iowa caucuses are the inaugural event of the American presidential nomination process. When the state Democratic Party failed to report the 2020 caucus results in a timely manner and manage the consequences, the crisis situation threatened the legitimacy of the party and the integrity of the results. This research presents an in-depth case of the Iowa Democratic Party’s public communication response regarding an event described by the Des Moines Register as “hell” and a “results catastrophe.” Specifically, we were interested in how the Iowa Democratic Party responded to the crisis event and the extent to which the party organization was successful in disseminating favorable messaging about the caucus process to the local press. Drawing on organizational crisis management and echoing press perspectives, this analysis uses network and qualitative analytic approaches to assess message development, dissemination, and ultimately adoption. A local event with national implications presents a critical case in investigating how a political party, due to its institutional role in American elections and unique organizational structure, struggled to respond to the crisis.

Democratic Disarray: Organizational Messaging Coherence and the Local Echoing Press During the 2020 Iowa Democratic Caucus

2021 ◽  
pp. 000276422199280
Author(s):  
Eric C. Wiemer ◽  
Joshua M. Scacco ◽  
Brenda Berkelaar
Keyword(s):  
Political Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Public Communication ◽  
Organizational Crisis ◽  
Party Organization ◽  
Timely Manner ◽  
Presidential Nomination ◽  
Des Moines ◽  
American Elections ◽  
State And Local

The Iowa caucuses are the inaugural event of the American presidential nomination process. When the state Democratic Party failed to report the 2020 caucus results in a timely manner, researchers began to assess how party and press officials co-constructed the events. This research presents an in-depth case of the Iowa state and local Democratic Party’s public communication response regarding an event described by the Des Moines Register as “hell” and a “results catastrophe.” Specifically, we were interested in how the Iowa Democratic Party responded to the crisis event and the extent to which the party organization was successful in disseminating favorable messaging about the caucus process to the local press. Drawing on organizational crisis management and echoing press perspectives, this analysis uses network and qualitative analytic approaches to assess message development, dissemination, and ultimately adoption. A local event with national implications presents a critical case in investigating how a political party, due to its institutional role in American elections and unique organizational structure, struggled to respond to the crisis.

scholarly journals Introduction: Studying Southern Political Party Activists

2003 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
John A. Clark ◽  
Charles Prysby
Keyword(s):  
Political Party ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
The Political ◽  
Party Organization ◽  
Southern Politics ◽  
Party Organizations ◽  
Southern States ◽  
The Past ◽  
Party Activists

The political changes that have occurred in the South over the past several decades have affected the political party organizations in the region. A region once marked by a weak and highly factionalized Democratic Party organization and an almost non-existent Republican Party organization now has two significant party organizations operating in each state. Examining the development of party organizations in the region should tell us much about both political party organizations and southern politics. This study, the Southern Grassroots Party Activists 2001 Project, focuses on political party activists active at the county level. Over 7,000 activists in the eleven southern states were surveyed in 2001. This study is linked to the 1991 Southern Grassroots Party Activists Project, which surveyed a similar group of activists, using a similar questionnaire. The following articles both analyze the 2001 data patterns and compare the 2001 results to the 1991 patterns.

scholarly journals Crisis Communication Preparedness Practices Among U.S. Charitable Organizations: Results From a National Survey

SAGE Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 215824402110145
Author(s):  
Ryan P. Fuller ◽  
Antonio La Sala
Keyword(s):  
Nonprofit Organizations ◽  
Crisis Management ◽  
Crisis Communication ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Word Of Mouth ◽  
Negative Word ◽  
Organizational Crisis ◽  
Crisis Planning ◽  
Charitable Organizations ◽  
Major Stakeholder

Organizations should prepare for crises, through identifying crisis concerns, having written crisis communication plans, and designating teams for crisis planning and response, for example. Nonprofit organizations, which represent an important sector of U.S. society, are no different in needing to prepare, but to date, a review of their crisis communication preparedness is lacking. Therefore, a national online survey of 2,005 U.S. charitable organizations was administered to determine nonprofit organizations’ adoption of an anticipatory perspective of crisis management. The anticipatory perspective shifts the organization’s focus from reaction to crises to anticipation of them. According to the survey, 75% of organizations reported at least one organizational crisis in the 24 months prior to taking the survey (circa 2017–2019). Loss of a major stakeholder was the most common organizational crisis that had occurred and the greatest future concern. Most nonprofits (97.5%) reported implementing some crisis communication preparedness tactics. Importantly, charitable organizations can enact communication preparedness tactics without significantly detracting from program delivery. Moreover, given the general concerns within the sector, nonprofit organizations should prepare specifically for loss of a major stakeholder and technologically created crises such as data breaches and negative word of mouth on social media.

scholarly journals Introduction (Special Edition – The Presidential Nomination Process)

2008 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 289-291
Author(s):  
Wayne P. Steger
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
General Election ◽  
The Political ◽  
Election Campaign ◽  
Special Edition ◽  
Presidential Nomination ◽  
General Elections ◽  
Democratic Country

Understanding why certain candidates get nominated is an important aspect of political scientists. This topic is a narrow one and influences a wider variety of subjects such as the political parties, general elections, and even the extent to which the United States is a democratic country. Presidential nominees matter—they become the foremost spokesperson and the personified image of the party (Miller and Gronbeck 1994), the main selectors of issues and policies for their party’s general election campaign (Petrocik 1996; Tedesco 2001), a major force in defining the ideological direction of a political party (Herrera 1995), and candidates that voters select among in the general election. This volume is devoted to presidential nominations and the 2008 nomination specifically.

Economic Performance and Elite Defection from Hegemonic Parties

2010 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-110 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ora John Reuter ◽  
Jennifer Gandhi
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Economic Performance ◽  
Political Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Chief Executive ◽  
Original Dataset ◽  
Democratic Regimes ◽  
Hegemonic Parties

Hegemonic party regimes are non-democratic regimes that (1) rule with the aid of a dominant political party and (2) hold multi-party elections. Elite coalitions organized under the aegis of a hegemonic party are most vulnerable in elections that coincide with poor economic performance. A declining economy provides elites with a platform around which they can mobilize support to challenge incumbents in elections. As a result, the likelihood of defections from hegemonic parties increases as income declines. This study’s original dataset, which includes 227 elections for the chief executive in hegemonic party dictatorships from 1946 to 2004, and its case studies of defections in Zimbabwe under ZANU-PF in 2008 and Turkey under the Democratic Party in 1955 provide evidence for this proposition.

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