We report on a comparative study of online search behavior and the traditional industrial era media of metropolitan newspapers and primetime broadcast television. Does the public sphere look any different when viewed through a typical search engine? From data collected in 2006 and 2007 we find...

This paper uses the events surrounding and reactions to blogger/journalist David Weigel's dismissal from the Washington Post to explore three themes in the rapidly media ecology of the United States. First, the Weigelgate episode was rooted in conflicting interpretations of the journalist's...

This paper analyzes the role of political discussion during the 2008 election campaign with a special focus on how frequently Italians talk about politics, how important they consider political discussion by comparison with other channels of information, and how congruent their discussion...

Since the mid-2000s, Britain's political communication environment has undergone rapid change. During the 2010 election campaign, television continued its dominance as the most important medium through which the British public acquires its political information, as Britain's first ever live...

This paper develops a model of electoral targeting in multi-party systems. Seat-share maximizing parties can use policy transfers to win votes by 1) converting undecided voters, 2) mobilizing loyal supporters, or 3) lowering the turn-out of voters loyal to other parties. The model allows for the...

The Bundestag elections of 2009 meant a crushing defeat for the German social democrats. Never before had a party faced losses at such a high percentage in post-war Germany. The paper argues that these losses were not incurred at the margin but at the core of the social democrats' traditional...