NAS Lecture Series - The Presidential Elections

Prof. Dr. Jared Sonnicksen, RTWH Aachen:
Polarization and president-centeredness are widely well-known patterns of U.S. politics. This should be striking, given that the U.S. Constitution and political system separate powers between government branches and levels in a federal system. Yet despite division of powers and decentralization, national political-party competition, als around the presidency, has meanwhile intensified across the polity. These trends may, in turn, make individual states more relevant than ever. Against this backdrop, Dr. Sonnicksen’s lecture focuses on the 2024 election in the larger context of how federal and democracy interact in the U.S., and interrogates the role of the states in the electoral process.