R. Kenneth Carty and D. Munroe Eagles, "Preface:Party Organization and Campaigning at the Grass Roots," Party Politics, 9 (September 2003), 539.

First Paragraph:
For some decades, students of elections have been convinced that local constituency-level campaigns do not matter. They have argued that it is national party campaigns, driven by sophisticated polling, television messaging and focused around the appeals of leadership that determine election outcomes. This is so even in electoral systems that maintain geographically based electoral districts. New work is reassessing that conventional wisdom and finding it wanting.

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Last Paragraph:
These articles were delivered as part of a workshop entitled 'Local Campaigning in Comparative Perspective' held during the 2002 annual meetings of the Canadian Political Science Association in Toronto.