The Candidate Samuel Popkins - Book Report/Review Example

 The Candidate – Samuel Popkins “The candidate – What it takes to win and hold the White House” is authored by Samuel L. Popkin. The book focuses particularly on election campaigns, and gives suggestions and anecdotes on how to win the US Presidential elections. Born in June 1942, Popkin is a political scientist who is also a professor at the University of California, San Diego. Popkin holds a PhD degree from MIT, and has a crucial role in finding the rational choice theory in the field of political sciences. Professionally, Popkin has years of experience working as a pollster. Moreover, Popkin holds publications in diverse fields within political sciences; ‘The Reasoning Voter – Communication and Persuasion in Presidential Campaigns’ is one of his earlier compositions, after which he co-authored ‘Issues and Strategies: The Computer Simulation of Presidential Campaigns’ amongst other relevant publications. Other subjects over which his expertise lie are the politics in East and Southeast Asia which was materialized in the form of his publication, ‘The Rational Peasant: The Political Economy of Rural Society in Vietnam’. Also, Popkin was hired as a consultation analyst for the Bill Clinton Presidential Campaign for strategy and polling. He had also worked on the News Election Units of CBS News Network on survey analysis and design. His recent works include consultancy on Gore Presidential election campaign. Furthermore, he also offers consultancy for Canadian and European political campaigns. Thus, given his experience and line of expertise his credibility on the book being reviewed, i.e. The Candidate, can`t be challenged and can be used as a blueprint for success in Presidential elections in the US. ‘The Candidate’ offers structural analysis of the various kinds of personalities owned by the Presidential Candidates. The book revolves around the assumption, based on research and logical facts, that the presidential elections campaigns in the US have two kinds of winners. One of these being the inevitable winner i.e. the one who seemingly is winning right at the beginning of the elections, and the other being the one who acquires victory after the campaign ends. The former includes candidates such as Rudy Giuliani or on another case Hillary Clinton when she contested for elections in 2008. Moreover, Popkin has also commented on the campaign strategies adopted by Ronald Reagan to highlight the significance of teamwork in election campaigns. In addition, he unfolds the complexities and the intricacies of such campaigns and continues to explain the most minute details and the bigger picture, also the most shocking blunders, precisely narrating the inside stories of the election campaigns in the US to elaborate on what makes a successful campaign different from a failed one. For supporting his arguments, Samuel Popkin seeks support from research on around 60 years of Presidential Campaigning in the US history. Via research and analysis, Popkin is able to point out and explain how challengers make it to the office of the President, how incumbents manage to acquire the office after re-election and how a party successor holds on to the position. Though analysis is acquired from 60 years of presidential campaigning history, but to prove the point, the focus has been kept on three campaigns in particular, all three being aggressive yet considerably recent. The first one being that of George H W Bush when he ran for re-elections in 1992, the second one being Al Gore`s election campaign in 2000 which also turned out to be disappointing and the third one explaining the flawed strategies of Hillary Clinton nomination campaign in 2008. Further elaborating, Popkin writes that it is essential for any presidential candidate to embody three roles, balancing them all at the same time. The candidate must possess strong traits inherent to that of a monarch to maintain the dignity and honor of the office of the president. In addition, he/she must be a visionary who has a sound and an appealing plan to drive the US into a direction which may also be implied to as a symbolic role. Thirdly, and most importantly, he/she must be a CEO who has the capability to run the campaign like an enterprise, i.e. knows how to manage and delegate the campaign staff. The role that he has to adopt is subject to change depending on whether he is running as an incumbent, or as a challenger or like a successor. Further elaborating on the roles, Samuel Popkin is of the view that the election campaign is the easiest for a challenger, since he doesn’t have any past record to base his campaign on. He is on the advantage of making any promises, no matter how impractical, without the fear of having anyone to question on his mandate. An incumbent, on the other hand, is subject to dire criticism, like in case of the recent Obama campaign, where the candidate has to defend all his past stances and base the entire campaign not only on future agenda but also on his past achievements and blunders. The worst case scenario, according to Popkin, is that of a successor, as he doesn’t only have to be his own defender, rather he is held responsible for all the decisions and initiatives of his predecessor. For him, balancing his own vision with that of the party line and the one adopted by the predecessor needs immense homework and patience. The author implies that though strategizing for the campaign and polling are also integral parts of the US election campaign, they aren’t as important as management and organization. This includes the author`s ability to apply his authority in such a way that he manages his time, resources and attention in the most effective way, exactly how managers of any company do. Also, the success of a campaign depends on the ability of the candidate to exhibit flexibility when exposed to unforeseen chaos and the shifting demands of the campaign. The instances narrated above are taken as case studies to prove the point that managing the campaign is most crucial to achieving victory in elections. He highlights the mistakes committed unconsciously by the candidates in the past. For instance, when Hillary Clinton ran for elections in 2007, she took the position of an incumbent while in truth she was the challenger. Popkin specifically mentions that her campaign focused on ‘as if she were a leader in exile’ which was inherently incorrect. Also, her immense trust on Mark Penn for advisory on campaign affairs got her into trouble. On the other hand, Obama carried the vision of transforming the state and bringing change, to which Clinton didn’t respond very well. Similarly, when George H W Bush ran for reelections in 1991, he was the incumbent whose victory was inevitable. He wasn’t for-seeing that the voters would reject his mandate on the basis that his take on social issues and tax reforms wasn’t very intriguing. He already assumed that his foreign policy successes and the end of the cold-war era alongside victory in Iraq would definitely bring him the sympathy of his voters, but he fell prey to the dilemma. Again, like in case of Hillary, he wasn’t capable enough to adapt to the vision and proposals being offered by Bill Clinton, who claimed to be the Dew Democrat and who would give a new meaning to everything. Similarly, Al Gore had convened the role of the successor, however, again he didn’t manage to adapt to the surroundings very well. He had to carry the baggage left behind by Clinton during his campaign, which implied that his party was held responsible for all the wrong-doings of Clinton. Moreover, the campaign wasn’t very well managed, as his family and the White House aides guided him in different directions. Thus, his campaign was flawed for being disorganized, also because running as a successor is the most difficult of all the roles which his campaign team didn’t handle well. Thus, the cases for failure offer a trail and paradigm on the dont`s of the election campaign which are in sync with the assumptions he pose right in the beginning of the book, which can be adeptly regarded as the thesis of the book. References: Popkin, Samuel L. The Candidate: What It Takes to Win, and Hold, the White House. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. Print. Read More