Political scientists say presidential debates have rarely, if ever, mattered
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While political pundits love to impart great meaning and importance to these events, political scientists aren't so convinced. As John Sides, a political scientist at George Washington University, wrote recently in Washington Monthly:
"Scholars who have looked most carefully at the data have found that, when it comes to shifting enough votes to decide the outcome of the election, presidential debates have rarely, if ever, mattered … in the average election year, you can accurately predict where the race will stand after the debates by knowing the state of the race before the debates."
The presidential debate myth: not the 'game-changer' you might think
As it happens the big expert in Britain on televised election debates is a former Socialist Party member, Steve Coleman. Here he is on the 3-way debate at the last UK general election:http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00ymx1pNote that, while his findings might be interesting, he fails to make the point that what's wrong with these debates is that they are between rival leaders seeking a following.
I just watchedhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/9403559.stmand it sounds like debates are;good for TV,good for turnout,but unproven for changing minds that are already made up.I also noticed in America thathttp://freeandequal.org/are hosting presidential debates with third-party candidates on October 23. Looking forward to that.
Maybe no-holds barred debate as entertainment is the most useful form of debate? Fox News pundit Bill O'Reilly debated satirical news presenter of Comedy Central's the Daily Show – Jon Stewart last night. Here is the videohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5ESZOFwm9A
jondwhite wrote:Maybe no-holds barred debate as entertainment is the most useful form of debate? Fox News pundit Bill O'Reilly debated satirical news presenter of Comedy Central's the Daily Show – Jon Stewart last night. Here is the videohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5ESZOFwm9AI'm afraid our experience in challenging others to debate — both as individuals and as organizations — is more often negative than positive. They almost invariably decline or — worse still — pull out at the last moment.There are exceptions of course and some of them appear in the Audio / Visual section above. I believe more are in the process of being added so keep your eyes peeled.
Of our recent debates the one I thought would go the worst actually went the best. I really enjoyed the positive money debate. Whereas the zeitgeist one was fairly embarrassing and the CPGB one was just a very strange atmosphere, but I think a lot of that was down to them.
The CPGB fringe might have seemed strange to some if it was interpreted as a debate since it was actually a single-issue single-speaker talk.
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