Hi professor and class,

Educational inequalities is the major issue affecting voter turnout in the United States. It means that low educated citizens are mostly ignorant and oblivious of the voting process while highly educated citizens participate significantly in political processes like voting. Lauderdale et al., (2020), note that as a result of this inequality in participation, the interests of the educated and the wealthy of the political class will be considered giving them more power and influence to rule over the low class and lowly educated. The most effective strategy of increasing voter turnout is introducing policies and lows that make education affordable and accessible. Secondly, voter education and mobilization is necessary especially to low-income communities. The more they understand the importance of the voting process, the more inclined they are to participate and voice their interests of political decisions and process.

Reference

Lauderdale, B. E., Bailey, D., Blumenau, J., & Rivers, D. (2020). Model-based pre-election polling for national and sub-national outcomes in the US and UK. International Journal of Forecasting, 36(2), 399-413.

~Traneisha

Ivory Parker

Hello Class,

Charismatic presidential leadership in the United States is related to voter turnout. Most charismatic leaders are grouped in the power elite group because of their power to lead people lawfully. According to the research by Williams and Pillai, charismatic leaders inspire emotions for other people and, as a result, gain a lot of followers (Pombeni, 2008). However, leadership is a way of gaining wealth, and political leaders are grouped in the upper class. Therefore, voter turnout is related to the class stratification principle.

Charismatic leadership involves inspiring people to great visions. People vote for leaders who are able to create a great vision by taking risks, representing citizens confidently in the government, and fulfilling the promises made during the campaign (Pombeni, 2008). Charismatic leaders gain many votes as the citizens obey them and have a positive attitude towards their missions. Research by Williams has shown that charismatic leadership is associated with workers’ performances in organizational institutions (Pombeni, 2008). People in certain organizational institutions are motivated if the employer is a charismatic leader. Thus, a charismatic leader has a high potential of gaining more votes.

There are crucial strategies to increase voter turnout. Firstly, is creating a charismatic leader-voting behavior relationship (Pombeni, 2008). People need to be led lawfully by their leaders. Therefore, there must exist a strong leader-voter relationship. Secondly, social inequalities among people and leaders should be eliminated as it transmitted from generation to generation (Thomas & Mark, 2013). Mostly the poor are left out, and as a result, the number of voters decreases (France & Brandeis, 2021). Thirdly, corruption in the voting sector should be eliminated. Therefore, it is significant to eliminate all forms of inequalities and corruption to increase voter turnout.

Class is a powerful stratification principle that groups people into the upper class and power elite group. The upper class comprises the wealthiest people, and the power elite group comprises powerful people in society. In addition, charismatic leaders gain a lot of votes due to their high potential to inspire people.

Ferejohn, J. (2012). Rising inequality and American politics.

France, A., & Brandeis, L. (2021). Political inequalities.

Getty, J., & Mills, C. (2021). The upper class and the power elite.

Howard University. (2014). Democracy, meritocracy and the uses of education. Negro education.

Pombeni, P. (2008). Charismatic leadership between ideal type and ideology. Journal of political ideologies, 13(1), 37-54. Doi: 10.1080/13569310701822248

Thomas, R., & Mark, N. (2013). Population size, network density, and the emergence of inherited inequality. Social forces, 92(2), 521-544. Doi: 10.1093/sf/so