Political scientists are charged with explaining the recurrent elements in the politics of presidential selection. Journalists are charged with explaining the elements of the moment. The best political scientists are nevertheless able to apply their larger analytic framework to the specific developments of the day. Just as the best journalists are able to frame those developments in some larger theoretical context. Political history, however, has been notably unkind to political scientists and journalists alike, when it comes to predicting the specific outcome of contests over presidential nominations—and elections. Inevitably, then, the year 1984 appears as the next challenge to scholarly, and journalistic, interpretation.

The principal sources of change in the contemporary politics of presidential selection, those categories of events which are the meat of working journalists, are themselves comparatively stable and would thus seem ideally suited to the investigations of working political scientists as well. These include the institutional framework for the nomination and then the election. They include the field of contenders which begins the chase for a nomination, and narrows in the conflict over final election. They include major public issues, both those which surface with some regularity and those which really are specific to one presidential year. And they include the organized interest groups, recognized constituencies, and rank-and-file individuals who participate at varying levels and in varying mixes from campaign to campaign. In the face of these regularized elements of change, of course, the strategies and tactics of elite contenders and mass participants also reliably shift. For 1984, every one of these categories shows some further evolution, or at least some new, noteworthy twist.

The Democratic party's quadrennial exercises in reform of the delegate selection process have caused political scientists and journalists to focus their attention on the Democratic party and to ignore the character and impact of the Republican rules. While the Democrats have been going through major revisions of their rules every four years since the disastrous 1968 convention, the Republicans have followed a quite different strategy. They have sought to maintain the basic procedures and party structure which had evolved prior to the era of the McGovern-Fraser Commission, and they have directed their efforts toward supporting federal, state, and local candidates and party organizations.

The debate on the current presidential nominating system centers on the consequences of formal changes in the rules and laws governing it: the formalization of opportunities for participation in the Democratic Party as well as changes like public financing and the increased number of primaries affecting both parties. These changes undoubtedly have made the process more permeable and have thereby diminished the power of party elites and enhanced that of the shapers of mass participation such as candidate organizations, direct mail and communications specialists, and the mass media. Critics have faulted this system for replacing party professionals with others less interested in or less able to select nominees popular with voters and capable of governing if elected. In this short essay, I will examine some of the critics' arguments, note some positive effects of the reforms, and suggest that the new system is an apt one for the present, de-aligned electoral environment.

The possibility of a black contender for the Democratic presidential nomination has raised many interesting questions. Has the Democratic Party and its past nominees taken the black vote for granted? Can the black community reach a consensus on a black issue agenda? Can it agree on a candidate? Could a black candidate actually hurt black interests by dividing the liberal vote and throwing the nomination to a more conservative Democratic contender? Could the strategy seriously backfire in other less obvious ways? Do the presumed benefits, both symbolic and real, outweigh the potential costs? Could the threat of a candidacy be just as beneficial to black interests as the candidacy itself? Are there other strategies during the nomination process that could enhance black political power even more?

Although the debate has covered a wide range of questions, one crucial question has been ignored: how many delegates could a black presidential contender conceivably win in 1984? While few experts believe that a black contender could win a majority of delegates, many argue that, if the contest is close between two other contenders, blacks could be “kingmakers,” crowning the nominee in exchange for major policy concessions, patronage appointments, and, conceivably, the vice-presidency. If the nomination is not close, then a group of black delegates, at a minimum, would increase substantially black influence on important rules and platform decisions. Hopes based on these or any other convention scenario the mind can devise, however, depend on how well a black contender fares in the race for delegates. The larger his delegation, the more power he can potentially wield at the convention. Conversely, the smaller his delegation, the less power he will have.

Whether it is the politics of the nomination process, the politics of the general election, or the politics of governance, it is safe to say that all candidates will firmly announce that they represent “all the people.” Each will pronounce profusely that he or she “owes no one or no special interest group.” And each will insist that he or she will pursue policies based on principles, not on pressures.

So much for the rhetoric, and it is quite expected and understandable. Of course, it is acceptable to be against “big government” or “big business” or “special interests.” That, too, is expected. A serious (meaning, even slightly possible) contender for, and occupant of the White House will not long remain so if he or she bluntly announces otherwise, that is, that one's candidacy is largely reliant on farmers, or business, or unions, or minorities (racial or otherwise).

The reality, however, is frequently somewhat different, and it is not necessarily a matter of political cynicism to say this. The nature of the three forms of the electoral/ governance system almost dictates that people who strive to govern one system develop strategies to appeal to several constituencies. Specifically, in order to be nominated one must court delegates. In order to be elected, one must count state electoral votes. In order to govern, one must construct still other kinds of coalitions. Always, at each step, the system mandates strategies that disaggregate the electorate into manageable blocs and available constituencies.

Presidential candidates know that the “press” (that is, print and electronic media) is often a decisive force in American electoral politics and spend much of their time trying to manipulate it for their own benefit. To politicians it is really a personal political matter, and the tendency when they speak about it is to both personalize and over-generalize the decisiveness of its influence. Thus, in 1976, Ted Kennedy stated flatly, “The press made Carter,” whereas Jimmy Carter repeatedly complained of the press's crucial role in “unmaking him” as president.

To political scientists the impact of the press, particularly television, is of primarily “systematic” importance rather than of personal interest—except of course, for those who would like to spend some years in Washington as advisor-practitioners. Scholars and students know that television has changed things a lot, but we are not exactly sure how much and what kind of responsibility the press as a whole bears for the substantial institutional changes that have occurred in the last two decades. Let me offer briefly some of the conclusions I have come to after researching, thinking, and writing for some years on this topic. I shall look, first, at what is new about television news compared to the pre-electronic era and, second, how the most significant of these mass communications changes have affected our electoral institutions and the presidency itself.

A catalog of the general sources of change in the politics of presidential selection, with applications to 1984, might suggest that this politics has become more changeable—and hence more unpredictable—in the modern era, the period marked off by the extensive procedural reforms enacted after 1968. Yet an initial comparison of the period from 1968 through 1980 with the period from 1848 through 1860, from 1876 to 1888, or from 1912 through 1924—to pick several periods of a dozen years each—does not suggest that the ultimate decisions on nomination and even election in the modern era are any more (or less) unpredictable than in certain earlier periods.

What such a comparison does suggest is that the sources of unpredictability in presidential nomination and election contests are different than they once were. Once, the difficulty in calculating presidential outcomes was rooted in the fact that nominations were often realized inside national party conventions, where the bloc structure of the official party and the rules for balloting itself made all sorts of outcomes—many of them unforeseen—politically possible. Now, the comparable difficulty in calculating presidential outcomes is rooted in the process of delegate selection, where volatile public preferences and levels of participation, the constantly changing formal course of nomination politics, and the interaction among the candidates, the issues, and the other participants continue to make projection (equally) difficult.

The political science profession is very far indeed from having pronounced its last word on the subject of the reforms of the presidential nomination process which have so dramatically transformed American elections and the party system. The current wave of reform began over a decade ago, and, more or less on schedule, political scientists have now begun regularly to report findings that suggest that they have been incorporating questions about the consequences of these reforms into their research.

Many observers quite rightly have noted that central to debate about party reform among politicians and commentators have been questions of legitimacy that reflect varying conceptions of democratic theory. In this brief essay, I will consider a few of these questions further and speculate about the respects in which the work of political scientists might assist in resolving them.

Perhaps the earliest questions arose over the changes that reform seemed to induce in the sorts of people taking part in the national party conventions. Questions arose as to their “representativeness”—and especially in light of two successive Democratic national conventions— 1968 and 1972—at which there were many challenges to the right of delegates to be present. In 1968 the complaints centered on the propriety of seating delegates selected earlier than the election year and selected through processes dominated by state party leaders rather than by the insurgent forces of protest over the war in Vietnam. These complaints were largely ineffective in influencing the outcome of the 1968 nomination, but their impact on subsequent events was substantial. They formed the basis upon which the Democratic party undertook to examine the delegate selection process in its McGovern-Fraser Commission of 1969, and people associated with these complaints staffed the Commission.