If you think that negative campaigning has come to dominate the American electoral landscape, depresses voter turnout, is particularly effective in winning votes, and/or is detrimental to democracy, this book is a must read. Richard Lau and Gerald Pomper investigate a series of questions intended to illuminate these concerns. They utilize an extensive data set based on U.S. Senate elections from 1992 through 2002. Their findings are often quite startling. Negative campaigning does not appear to have the deleterious effects conventional wisdom would suggest.

The book is well organized and follows a natural progression. Beginning with a brief history of negative campaigning (going back to the Adams/Jefferson race of 1800), the authors note that many observers believe that negative campaigning is more prevalent today, works, and may have a “corrosive influence on participatory democracy” (p. 3). They define negative campaigning as “talking about the opponent—criticizing his or her programs, accomplishments, qualifications, and so on” (p. 4) (more on this later). To measure “campaign tone,” they rely on newspaper accounts and statements coming from spokespersons of the campaigns, not authors of the articles.

Having set the context for their study, the authors then review the literature using meta-analysis—a technique seldom used in political science. Essentially, this approach standardizes the major findings from other studies, leading to conclusions as to the overall state of research in a given area. They find “no significant support for the suppositions that negative political ads are especially disliked, are especially effective, or substantially undermine public support for and participation in the electoral process” (p. 21). This review is one of the many strengths of this book. It provides a comprehensive look at the literature and points to the need for further research.

Next, the authors delve into their data and address the question “Who uses negative campaigning?” They find that about one-third of campaigning is negative (much less than one might assume) and that it comes about largely as a rational course of action for candidates responding to the campaign environment—primarily challengers, those with less money than their opponent, and those who are themselves attacked. They find that negative campaigning is not a response to a “general handbook of campaign rationality” (p. 37). Throughout their data analysis in this and later chapters, Lau and Pomper utilize two-stage least squares procedures to properly correct for the problem of endogeneity arising because of the relationship between campaign spending and campaign tone. They demonstrate several creative approaches in variable construction to explore the interactive effects of campaign tone with campaign spending and campaign exposure, analyze the effects of myriad variables on election outcomes, and present results from both aggregate and individual-level survey data. In addition, Senate contests with incumbents are treated separately from open-seat races. This methodology is valuable to the reader in and of itself.

Although the many findings from this study are too numerous to report here, overall Lau and Pomper conclude that negative campaigning may have an effect on election outcomes, but that that effect is inconsistent and can do more harm than good to a candidate. As they note, for example, negative campaigning does not “provide a ringing endorsement for the effectiveness of attacking the opponent as a campaign strategy in open seat elections” (p. 70). Similar conclusions emerge when the authors examine the effects of negative campaigning on voter turnout and attitudes of political efficacy and trust. Negative campaigning can matter, but its effects are modest to nonexistent and inconsistent in direction. Following their data analysis, some normative thoughts on negative campaigning are provided in the final chapter. They consider features of our system that underlie the use of negative campaigning and suggest several “reforms” to deal with them. This chapter (and their earlier work) provides considerable insight as to why negative campaigning occurs and what can be done about it. The reader may take issue with some of their suggestions, but they stimulate intelligent discourse and provide a solid wrap-up to their findings.

Although Negative Campaigning is an admirable work, there were several weaknesses that deserve mention. First, the authors define negative campaigning on the basis of any comments about the opponent. Thus, if I mention my opponent's record regarding an issue or his/her qualifications to serve in office, I am engaging in negative campaigning. Most observers would consider that “negative” only if the candidate lies, distorts, or engages in “mudslinging.” There is simply no way to sort out what is truly negative in the conventional sense from what is, as the authors put it, comparative campaigning. As a consequence, this study loses some explanatory power. Second, while the “meta-analysis” used to provide a literature review is a useful tool, there is no explanation as to how other scholars have defined negative campaigning, which would give the reader additional insight as to how this topic has been approached. Finally, most of the methodology used in this study (such as the operationalization of variables and creation of new variables) is elaborated in the appendix. This leads to some frustration by forcing the reader to flip back and forth to interpret and understand the relevance of key variables.

Despite these shortcomings (and they are not severe), this work is a valuable addition to the research on negative campaigning. It is also a valuable addition to research into the effects of a host of more traditional factors on the outcome of elections and voting behavior. The use of an extended data set on Senate elections and survey data on voter behavior/attitudes provides a worthwhile addition to research in those areas. Negative Campaigning is thought provoking and would be an excellent supplemental reader for upper-level undergraduates and graduate students in courses on campaigning, voter behavior, and democratic theory. Indeed, it is a worthwhile read for anyone interested in the forces that shape the American electoral landscape.