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This is an illustrative, rather than exhaustive,
review
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Zvi Namenwirth used the General Inquirer to analyze all
major party platforms from 1844 to 1964. Later, he joined
with Lasswell in a similar study.- Namenwirth, J. Zvi,
"Some Long- and Short-Term Trends in One American
Political Value: A Computer Analysis of Concern with
Wealth in 62 Party Platforms," in George Gerbner et al.
(eds.), The Analysis of Communication Content (New
York: Wiley, 1969), pp. 223-241.
- Namenwirth, J. Zvi and
Harold D. Lasswell, The Changing Language of American
Values: A Computer Study of Selected Party Platforms
(Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications, Comparative
Politics Series, Number 01-001 (1970).
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- Gerald Pomper analyzed
U.S. party platforms without using computer methods, but
his research was quantitative and did use computer
methods of statistical analysis. Richard Rose did
comparable research on British parties, whose statements
of principles are called "election manifestos" rather
than "party platforms."
- Pomper, Gerald, with
Susan S. Lederman, Elections in America: Control and
Influence in Democratic Politics, 2nd Ed. (New Yok:
Longman, 1980).
- Richard Rose, Do
Parties Make a Difference? 2nd Ed. (Chatham,
NJ: 1984).
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- During the 1980s, a
group of European scholars undertook the Comparative
Manifesto Project, a cooperative effort to do a content
analysis of all party manifestos since the end of World
War II. Here is the first major publication from the
project and a citation to a recent publication from this
on-going project, which now covers parties in 20
countries from 1945 to 1985.
- Budge, Ian, David
Robertson, and Derek Hearl (eds.) (1987), Ideology,
Strategy and Party Change: Spatial Analyses of Post-War
Election Programmes in 19 Democracies. (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press)
- Pennings, Paul, and Hans
Keman (2002), "Towards a new methodology of estimating
party policy positions," Quality & Quantity
36: 55-79.
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- In conjunction with my former student, Robert Harmel,
and two Northwestern Graduate Students--Christine Edens
and Patricia Goff--I did a longitudinal analysis of
changes in party platforms (manifestos) following
election defeats.
- Kenneth Janda, et al., "Changes in Party Identity:
Evidence from Party Manifestos," Party Politics, 1
(April, 1995), 171-190.
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- Finally, mention should
be made to the recent work by Gerring, who analyzed the
platforms of the major U.S. parties from 1828 to
1996.
- Gerring, John. Party
Ideologies in America, 1828-1996. Cambridge
University Press, 1998.
- Gerring maintains
his own website, Description
of Primary Sources, which discloses the sources
for his research.
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