Exploring Announcement Dynamics in Select Republican Primary Elections

Author

Mitchell Redd, University of Mississippi. Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College

Date of Award

2018

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Department

Political Science

First Advisor

Charles E. Smith, Jr.

Relational Format

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

This thesis is a reflection of my general interests in intra-partisan electoral conflict. Empirically, my study is motivated by Aaron King's (2017) theory about the relationship between announcement timing in U.S. Senate primary contests and experience in the arena of federal elections. I develop a measure that credits candidates with the highest score if they are an incumbent Senator, then three lower scores ranging from higher office to no experience. I then examine how this measure relates to the timing of candidacy announcements inside nine upcoming Republican primary contests for U.S. Senate nominations. I test two, tentative hypotheses about how these measures fit together across all of the data I have gathered, and find some support for one of them. However, my thesis is largely inductive, embracing the aim of explaining the contexts of both recent trends in Republican party primary politics -- the present (2018) election's Bannon insurgency and the pre-Trump era's Tea Party activity.

Recommended Citation

Redd, Mitchell, "Exploring Announcement Dynamics in Select Republican Primary Elections" (2018). Honors Theses. 714.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis/714

Accessibility Status

Searchable text