But many black people expressed doubt on whether the electorate was really going to propel a black man into the White House.

Then quite suddenly in March race became an issue when the Jeremiah Wright controversy erupted.  William Storey focuses on race in the latest edition of tutor2u’s online Politics magazine, First Past the Post – well worth a read if your school has a subscription.

On Matt Frei’s Washington diary, the BBC’s Washington correspondent discusses how race has come to the fore during the campaign:

‘The numbers and the exit polls indicate that Barack Obama has a problem.

The man who started the nomination marathon by wooing predominantly white Iowa is ending it by failing to seduce predominantly white West Virginia.

Race has become an issue.

How do we know? Because in their exit polls the voters told us so.

On a subject where honesty tends to be conspicuous by its absence, one in five voters told the pollsters that race was a factor in their decision-making process.

And a significant number of Hillary voters said they would not vote for Mr Obama if he was the nominee.

No Democratic nominee can win without the support of African Americans.

But nor can they prevail if white, blue-collar voters opt for John McCain - that is the Democratic Party’s biggest conundrum.’

Frei then goes on to talk about a meeting with a Michigan voter:

‘Geoff, a long-distance truck driver with too little work, was only buying Hillary’s message.

“If Obama is our candidate, I am voting for McCain.”

Why? “Lack of experience. He’s too young. He hasn’t done much. He’s never suffered like John McCain did during the Vietnam War. And, yes, race is a part of it too.”

Unprompted, Geoff referred to the Reverend Wright issue.

It was a refrain we heard over and over again.’

Read the full article here

So if Obama clinches the nomination, can he win the battle against McCain in the autumn for white working class votes?  As I alluded to previously, if you had asked me in January I would have said yes.  But now I am not so sure.  There appears to be a significant number of voters who still cling to the politics of the past and pledge that they would not vote for a black candidate under any circumstances.

Some points to consider when reading the article:

To what extent has gap between blacks and whites in America closed in the last 40 years?
Outline the two schools of thought on the importance of racism in America
What has been happening to racial preference policies in university admissions?  Do you agree with the changes?
Are black people always paid less, and less wealthy than white people?
Is the criminal justice system racially biased?
Is the American Dream more or less of a reality for blacks than before?

You can access nearer to overcoming here

Tax varying powers
Scotland was also granted greater fiscal power by being able to vary the basic rate of tax by 3p in the pound.  Wales was granted no such power.  Scottish legislators would then be able to exercise this power to change public expenditure without needing permission from Whitehall, with the expectation that it would go up rather than down.  Indeed both the SNP and the Lib Dems stated that they would consider raising the level of tax in the first term.  The transfer of tax-varying powers to Holyrood is said to be a compromise resulting from discussions about what powers the new Parliament would have.  Since 1999 there have been demands for increased fiscal autonomy.

More sustained debate
Greater powers can be attributed to there being a more sustained debate about the need for devolution north of the border.  The Scottish Constitutional Convention (SCC) was set up in 1988 (stimulated to a fair degree by anger at Thatcher’s plan to introduce the Poll Tax north of the border a year before the rest of the UK would have it) to determine the best framework for governing Scotland.  The SCC was a cross-party body and is largely credited with paving the way for a Scottish Parliament.  An equivalent body did not exist in Wales and therefore devolution did not have as a high a profile in that region.  We should also bear in mind that Scotland has a much more distinct media than in Wales, for instance it has several national newspapers (e.g. the Scotsman) while Wales has none.

Greater tradition of administrative devolution
Another reason used to justify why Wales was given what is now commonly referred to as “devolution lite” is that Scotland has a greater tradition of administrative devolution.  The Scottish Office was given much more discretion in deciding how UK laws were administered and it also had a separate church, legal and educational system – hence why Scottish universities usually offer 4 year rather than 3 year degrees.

A nationalist surge?
A les charitable reason to explain why devolution was asymmetrical was that there was a greater need for Scotland to be “bought off”.  The SNP were seen as a greater electoral threat than Plaid Cymru and Labour needed to neutralise it.

Reflected in support in referendums
A common mistake by students is the suggestion that Scotland was given more power because voters showed more enthusiasm for the proposals than the Welsh in the twin set of referendums in 1997.  This is putting the cart before the horse.  The reason why there was a lower Yes vote and lower turnout in Wales was precisely because what they were offered was less significant.  Even pro-devolutionists in Wales suggested that the new Assembly would be little more than a “talking shop”.

Policy outcomes
How has the difference in powers manifested itself in policy terms?  Certainly Scotland has forged a more distinctive path – or “ploughed a tartan” furrow as one wag put it.  They scrapped up-front tuition fees, abolished fox hunting, repealed section 28, gave a generous settlement to Scottish teachers, and introduced free care for the elderly.  Despite a more narrow set of powers, the Welsh First Minister, Rhodri Morgan, endeavoured to put “clear red water” between his assembly and New Labour.  Witness the abolition of school league tables, free bus travel for pensioners, and free school milk for infants.  And since being granted new powers over higher education this element of the Celtic fringe has also scrapped tuition fees for its students.

Reasons for the two party hegemony in the USA are well worn: the electoral college; money; ballot access; lack of ideological space, etc.

But that does not mean that they can’t have an impact.  Perot in 1992 is the most successful 3P presidential candidate in recent years, taking just under 20% of the vote.  True, he failed to pick up any ECVs, but he did help shape the policy agenda in terms of welfare reform and government spending. 

Nader in 2000 could well have cost Gore the elections by taking votes from the Democrat candidate in Florida. 

Such could be the impact of a new entrant in the 2008 race, Bob Barr.

According to the Post:

“Former Republican Rep. Bob Barr launched a Libertarian Party presidential bid Monday, saying voters are hungry for an alternative to the status quo who would dramatically cut the federal government.

His candidacy throws a wild card into the White House race that many believe could peel away votes from Republican Sen. John McCain given the candidates’ similar positions on fiscal policy.”

With polls indicating that the 2008 contest this autumn is likely to be as close as the previous two elections, McCain is unlikely to welcome this news.

But ratings given for quality of teaching are useful pointers to the kind of education you will receive as an undergraduate.  Bear in mind that the research intensive universities that top the rankings lists overall don’t always focus on delivering good courses at degree level, often leaving much of the teaching and assessment to graduate students rather than the high profile academics whose books you may be led to read.

They can also be useful for pointing potential applicants in the direction of a university they may not have considered given its strength in a particular subject area.

In the case of Politics the usual suspects are listed, although Essex (arguably one of the top three institutions in Europe for its research in the subject) fares surprisingly badly.

Full rankings can be found here

A hard copy may be a useful purchase for the supporting articles. 

2. The importance of Scottish votes has been overstated by the Conservatives.  Research by the Constitution Units has identified only two instances where it could be said their influence was clear cut, and none have occurred since the 2005 election.

3. The issue of finance to the regions is one that is more complex than many critics of the West Lothian Question are letting on.  Will the Conservatives also argue that the North East is over-funded as they seek to recapture lost electoral ground in that area at the next election?

4. On the constitutionality of the relationship between a ministers constituency and the area controlled by their office, the Tories had little to say about how improper it was to have an MP from outside Wales control the Welsh Office as John Redwood did in the 1990s.  It seems likely that the Conservatives in opposition are merely seeking to make political capital out of the new devolved settlements.

5. Although there is some support for English only votes, there appears to be little public support for an English Parliament.  A slight reduction in the number of MPs sent from the Celtic fringes might solve the whole issue more or less instantly.

2. Further controversy was heaped on the issue after New Labour delivered devolution and subsequently many Conservative MPs went on to claim that Scottish MPs were telling England what to do.  They claimed that bills such as top up fees for students in England (passed in 2004), which are not payable for students in Scotland, would not have been carried if English only MPs would have been able to vote.

3. On a related note, this is controversial since it is argued that students in Scotland have been given a free university education only due to the generous settlement Scotland receives from the Treasury – the Daily Mail argued that the £2bn bill for Scottish students would be footed by taxpayers across the UK.  In this way, this is a “double whammy” for families in England.

4. Another difficulty identified is the constitutionality of ministers elected from Scottish constituencies controlling departments that effectively are England only – when John Reed was Health Minister this was the case.  And obviously we have a Prime Minister who is himself from a Scottish constituency.

5. Further problems have arisen when it comes to proposed solutions to this supposed conundrum.  Some Tories have proposed a form of English Parliament or English only votes for English only laws.  The complexity of this solution has caused severe headaches for constitutional scholars.  First, any bill which involves the use of public funds has implications for the whole of the UK in terms of taxation and spending.  Second, MPs from outside England see themselves as representing the whole of the UK – after all they are elected at the same time.

But this turned out not to be the case.  Although Ken Livingstone won slightly more 2nd preference votes than Boris Johnson, the Tory candidate took far more 1st preference votes for it to make any difference to the final outcome as he won by 53% to 47%.  Interestingly Livingstone picked up over 200,000 more votes than he did when winning in 2004, as turnout surged in this close election to 45%

The Assembly election did not produce a favourable outcome for George Galloway’s Respect Party, but other minor parties fared well as a result of the “top up” mechanism used for the London-wide members.

As predicted the two main parties cleared up in the 14 Constituency races, but the 8% of votes picked up by the Greens across London produced 2 seats and the BNP won their first seat above local level (here I am categorising the London race as one that is regional/sub-national) after gaining over 130,000 votes in the top up ballot –scholars of electoral systems may choose to use this as an argument against using proportional electoral systems.  Richard Barnbrook, the newly elected BNP London Assembly Member may argue otherwise.

But the task here is to focus on up-to-date examples of how AMS is used with half an eye on the AS examinations.

The Assembly consists of 35 members, with 14 elected to represent different areas across London and 11 representing London as a whole.

The 14 Constituency Assembly Members are elected using first-past-the-post and like Westminster contests the candidate with the largest number of votes wins. 

The London-wide Assembly members contest seats by party (unless independent).  It is here that things get a bit complicated.  Seats are allocated according to a version of the d’Hondt formula – similar to that used in elections conducted under the Single Transferable Vote.  This takes into account the number of seats won in the Constituency contests and the percentage of vote cast on the London-wide ballot.  Further, it is also necessary to exceed a 5% threshold – in 2004 both Respect and the BNP failed by a margin of under half of one per cent here.

The calculation is: total number of votes won/seats already won (including Constituency seats) +1

So after each round the party with the highest number takes the London-wide seat.

In short, the calculation works to “top-up” those parties that have won a percentage of the vote that is proportionately higher than the seats won to seats available after taking into account the Constituency outcome.  It generally favours parties whose vote was not sufficiently concentrated as to pick up seats.

In 2004 the Conservatives won 9 of 14 Constituency seats and so won no additional London-wide seats.  By contrast the Liberal Democrats won no Constituency seats and picked up 5 London-wide seats.

It is widely predicted that both BNP and Respect will have won a large enough share of the votes to pick up seats in the Assembly in the London-wide contest.  For better or worse, at least it will raise the profile of this part of the elected Authority.

We will update once the 2008 results come in.

Background information from the London elects website
Factsheet 12: How the London Assembly is elected

Factsheet 8: Results from the 2004 London elections

For the elections I am not going to speculate on the implications of the outcome of the local polls in terms of what would happen if Labour drop to 25% or lay out the case for and against the two main candidates for London Mayor since these two issues are well covered in today’s national newspapers.

Instead I want to use the space to clearing up a few misunderstandings about the operation and workings of the Supplementary Vote system, and point out that in today’s London Mayor race second preference votes may well determine who gets to control City Hall for the next 4 years.

The Supplementary Vote is used in London mayor elections. If a candidate wins more than half of the first choice votes, then they are elected.  If no candidate wins over half of the first choice votes, then all but the top two candidates are eliminated and losers’ second preferences redistributed.

This is often confused by candidates with the Alternative Vote where voters also vote for their 1st and 2nd preferences but votes are redistributed from the bottom candidate and this process is repeated until a candidate gets over 50%, i.e. not all of the loser preferences are redistributed at the same time.

SV is therefore a majoritarian system since the winner needs over 50% of either the 1st preference votes or the 1st and 2nd preference votes together – since the 2nd preference voters effectively become 1st preference votes once the other candidates are eliminated the winner can claim a mandate from the majority of voters.

In the 2000 contest, Livingstone was clearly ahead on both the 1st preference and the combined 1st and 2nd preference count – although Norris did pick up slightly more 2nd preference votes therefore hinting at the capacity of the system to defeat the 1st preference winner

In 2004 the story more or less repeated itself, but this time Livingstone picked up the largest number of both 1st and 2nd preference votes.

This year it is predicted that the race between Boris and Ken is so tight that the candidate that wins most 1st preferences could lose if they pick up less 2nd preferences, and obviously vice versa. With Brian Paddick refusing to declare who he would like his supporters to give their second preference to, voting analysts have been unable to give clear predictions as to the outcome.  We will know more at some stage in the next 48 hours.

This comes in handy when covering topics like the representativeness of the Westminster Parliament, as well as comparisons with the new devolved assemblies.  It has also been a handy aide-memoire when looking at comparisons between the US Congress and the UK Parliament.

It also illustrates a host of other fascinating facts like:

Women in highest positions of state.  For instance, which of the following countries have either female (elected) heads of government or state? 

Ukraine
India
Finland
Canada
Mozambique

You can download a pdf of the poster here

Non-voting has a long history and is steeped in anarchist and communist tradition.  Both of these ideologies advocate an absence of government and strands of thought within these movements contended that there was no point in voting in a pseudo-democratic process for a better government if you did not believe in executive government arrangements.  This led to the well known slogan, “If voting changed anything, they’d abolish it”.

Going back to the posters, I wondered how other people would react when they saw them.  I discussed this with one of my Politics classes and they suggested that people might think that if certain people don’t like it here then they don’t have to live here.  A simplistic solution until you consider that many Muslims were born here.  But this reaction would not be unusual since I do remember stories when I was a student of communists campaigning for voters to spoil ballot papers at election time being told that if they didn’t like it, they should move to Russia. 

Divisions about the way we should be governed continue to permeate British society, but there are obvious differences between radical ideas in the shape of revolutionary socialism and Islamic fundamentalism, not least the kinds of pictures we have seen this week of one the 7/7 suicide bombers telling his young child that the action he was about to carry out was for her long term benefit. 

Racial tension can quickly boil over into violence and posters like the ones I saw this morning do little to promote multi-cultural harmony.

A further problem is, is that if voters do stay away from the polls on Thursday, they may end up with the candidate least able to deal with the challenges of racial integration in the UK. 

Non-voting by anarchist/communist groups has done little to alter the political framework over the last 50 years, so what will following a similar path achieve for Muslim groups?

Prime Ministers at other times experience difficulty in distancing themselves from the normal processes of government and appearing as outsiders via the utilisation of skilful media techniques.  And as Thatcher’s dominant premiership was followed by Major, who seemed to lurch from one crisis to another, likewise Blair’s is followed by the calamity that is Gordon Brown’s reign at No 10.

I don’t want to go into the ins and outs of the income implication of the abolition of the 10p starting rate of tax, rather the impact the handling of the issue has had on the Prime Minister’s authority.

The policy was, of course, announced in Gordon Brown’s final budget as Chancellor and one wonders why more fuss wasn’t made over the issue by MPs then.  Whatever, Labour backbenchers threatened to revolt over it since they argued that it would negatively affect millions of those on the lowest income.  Brown and his ministerial team responded to this by arguing that many would be better off.  That was a major tactical error.  Arguing that some households would be better off doesn’t mitigate the fact that MPs would have to tour their constituencies facing many of the party’s traditional supporters who could not get their head round the essential fact that whilst some may well benefit, others wouldn’t.  The threat of a backbench revolt initially saw government ministers try to argue the case and then gradually they have climbed down with promises of a number of concessions.  The final concession is a promise to backdate the loss of income for those most badly affected, and this has caused the leader of the revolt, Frank Field, to withdraw his timetabled amendment this week.

Gordon Brown has recently reorganised his team of special advisers at Downing Street following the fiasco over the election that never was and the dithering over Northern Rock.  But the presentation of this tax change policy has been a disaster.  It makes one wonder why Brown, an amazingly intelligent man and skilful politician has got himself in this mess.  This follows soon after the mini-PR disaster that was Gordon Brown’s “is he, isn’t he?” with regard to appearance at the opening ceremony in Beijing.  For a party that was so glad to get rid of Tony Blair there must have been an element of schadenfreude yesterday when the ex-PM was in the Commons yesterday to unveil a portrait of himself, and many Labour backbenchers in attendance were heard to utter how these kinds of policy gaffes would never have happened under him.

It has been an amazing rollercoaster ride for the New York Senator and she will now plough on arguing that she, not her opponent, can win the big swing states that will bring her party a win in this autumn’s general election.

It is not a major surprise that Hillary won here (I thought she’d win by six, although one of my colleagues thought - perhaps hoped? - Obama could do it.  Commiserations Dr Cook!).  Pennsylvania’s demographics are very similar to Ohio, a state she also won by double figures.  More, Obama may well have turned off voters with his “God and guns” gaffe in a state that was once described as Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with the South in between.

If Hillary had won by less than 10 points, we would probably expect Hillary to concede sooner or later, but she can now claim that the momentum is behind her and the superdelegates should back a candidate that does not shirk a good fight.

Obama will argue that he has energised the campaign, brought hundreds of thousands of new voters into the Democratic party and that he is ahead in the popular vote.

Whatever, it still seems that the largest beneficiary in the Democratic primary contest is the presumptive Republican nominee, John McCain.

See the BBC report by video clip here