The Positive Case for Negative Campaigning

For decades the conventional wisdom has been that voters hate negative campaigning. Some have even argued that it can be a deterrent to voting at all. The Positive Case for Negative Campaigning shows that negativity in campaigns is not only necessary, but is also often viewed as acceptable by voters themselves. The most comprehensive treatment to date of negativity in campaigns, Mattes and Redlawsk’s book attacks the subject using a host of different approaches, including formal models, survey research, and laboratory experiments. The ability of candidates to go on the attack and to explicitly focus on information that otherwise would not be revealed, provides voters with more and fuller information than they would have otherwise had. At the same time, the authors find that voters can and do accept negativity as a legitimate part of the political environment. Much of their supposed dislike can be explained by how survey questions are worded. Voters’ responses to negativity vary greatly and can be better explained by the content and believability of the ads than simply by whether the ads are negative. All told, Mattes and Redlawsk make an original and compelling case that voters are not as negative about negativity as previously believed, as well as for its positive benefits in political campaigning.

Kyle Mattes is assistant professor of political science at the University of Iowa. David P. Redlawsk is professor of political science at the Eagleton Institute’s Center for Public Interest Polling at Rutgers University. He is coauthor of several books, including Why Iowa?, also published by the University of Chicago Press.