Week 10 Study Guide – Political Parties – Part 2

I. General Announcements:
1. Please note the following revisions to the syllabus. (The make the course a bit more balanced I am basically
moving the quizzes back a week and moving up due dates for your thesis and paper.)
Quiz 3: Due April 3rd (this week)
Thesis: Due April 10th (next week)
Quiz 4: Due April 17th (week 12)
Research Paper: Due April 24th (week 13
Quiz 5: Due May 1st (week 14)
Quiz 6: Still due Wednesday May 25 (week 16)

2. If you haven’t yet selected you essay topic online, you should go back to Week 8 to see what options are still
available and make your selection online. Thesis paragraphs are due soon. Click on the week 11 icon to see exactly
what your thesis assignment involves.

3. This week you will complete the second part of the set of activities on political parties by forming coalitions with
your classmates. Click on the icon for a full description of the activity and how to do it. I suggest you start on this
week’s activity early in the week so that your classmates will have time to respond. Students who get a late start on
this often get left out. Group projects such as this always run the risk of some people carrying the load and others
flaking on their promises. I can only ask that you be respectful of your classmates by following through on any
commitment you make to a classmate. If you put out a request to someone and do not hear back from them, I would
assume they are not interested in working together and I would move on. However, if someone has promised to do
some task essential to the group but is not completing it in a timely manner, you can let me know and I will try to
encourage see what is up with them. Of course if this is all happening late Sunday night there might not be much that
can be done. Good luck.

II. Text Reading:

5th edition: Chpt. 7 (p. 219-226 only)
6th edition: Chpt. 7 (p. 236-243 only)

III. Activities:
1. Forum: Posting of Your Coalition Party (Go online ASAP to see full instructions.)
2. Quiz #3

IV. Terms/Concepts
Realignment /deviating and reinstating elections
Origins of the Democratic and Republican Parties
Significance of the following elections: 1800, 1824-28, 1860, 1896, 1932, 1968, 1980, 2006-08
The Populist Party
The Solid South – and how it has changed
Swing states
The New Deal Coalition and how it broke down
Goldwater and the Southern Strategy
Reagan Democrats and the Reagan coalition
1994 and the Contract for America
Current trends: party polarization, de-alignment, rise of independents
Each party’s challenge of position to keep the base and win the independents

V. Analytical Questions
1. Describe the political realignments took place between 1932 and 2008 and their causes? Also consider deviations and
reinstatements during this time frame. What is the evidence that we are on the verge of a historical realignment and what
factors argue against this?