ABSTRACT
Party unity has, indeed, been a pervasive problem for Democrats in recent presidential elections. By contrast, the vast majority of scholarship on presidential elections, primary and general, concludes that issues do matter. Public thinking about issues and ideology may not conform to a civics-book model of an ideal democratic citizenry, but the voters are capable, on the whole, of recognizing the broad differences between the presidential candidates and casting the ballots accordingly. This chapter presents a more detailed consideration of the two central propositions in the process-based theory of Democratic disharmony. It also presents a historical perspective on the findings, examining why the Democratic Party has assumed such a discordant and unwieldy character, and how both parties' level of internal unity has changed since the late 1960s. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
