THE DEBATE BOOK:
Standards and Guidelines for the Sponsorship of Political
Candidate Debates in Congressional, State and Local Elections
Edited by Ronald A. Faucheux
With Special Contributions from David Beiler, Janet Brown, Diana Carlin, Michael Cornfield,
Peter Francia & Mark Watts
For years, there was no commonly accepted standards or guidelines for political debates that
provide practical models for civic, media and political organizations to follow...until The
Debate Book. It is the objective of this book to assist in establishing fair and commonly accepted
guidelines for political debates below the presidential level and to encourage their use in all
federal, state and local elections. These standards include a series of recommendations and helpful
tips based on widespread input to assist in sponsoring and organizing a variety of debate formats
and models.
Contents include:
Chapter 1 deals with one of the most difficult issues of debate sponsorship:
candidate inclusion. This matter is critically important to the candidates and raises substantial
questions as to fairness and practicality.
Chapter 2 sets forth standards relative to debate set styles, formats and other matters related
to the structure and sponsorship of debates.
Chapter 3 provides a set of model debate ground rules that can be used in a wide variety of
broadcast and nonbroadcast debates with different formats and set styles.
Chapter 4 lays out question block options and how they can be consistently structured and
applied.
Chapter 5 details results from a nationwide poll of voters on debate issues.
Chapter 6 also discusses voter attitudes on debates, as identified in focus groups sponsored by
the project.
Chapter 7 presents ideas on how the Internet can be used to improve debate participation and
sponsorship.
Chapter 8 is an interview with Janet Brown, director of the Commission on Presidential Debates.
In it, she addresses a range of specific debate sponsorship issues that relate to statewide,
district and local elections.
Chapter 9 is a summary of interviews conducted with experienced debate organizers.
Chapter 10 is a series of practical "to do" checklists for debate sponsors and participants.
Chapter 11 explains the DebateWatch program and how it can be used to expand citizen participation
in political debates.
Chapter 12 is a review of literature and a summary of previous research findings on debates.
The Debate Advisory Standards Project, which produced The Debate Book, was created to improve
candidate debates by developing nonpartisan standards for debates and the sponsorship of debates.
The idea is to encourage substantive debates with fair formats and wide audiences, and to do so
in a comprehensive way that is unrelated to the agenda of any candidate, party or ideology. The
nonpartisan project reached out to participants in the political process, the broadcast industry
and the civic community to get broad-based input on issues affecting debate sponsorship. Voters
across the nation were surveyed to determine citizen attitudes on candidate debate matters. Input
has been sought from a wide variety of objective professionals, distinguished academics and public
figures as well as political participants representing numerous major and nonmajor political parties
and ideological persuasions. The Debate Advisory Standards Project was funded through a grant from
The Pew Charitable Trusts and sponsored by the Center for American Politics and Citizenship at the
University of Maryland, Dr. Peter L. Francia, Principal Investigator.
$25.00 (no shipping or handling cost)
To order THE DEBATE BOOK:
By credit card, call Judy Ditton 301-951-8941 or 1-800-888-5767 or e-mail to
Cepublish@aol.com
By check, make payable to "Campaigns & Elections Publishing Company" and mail
to: Ron Faucheux, 1555 North 22nd Street, Arlington, VA 22209 |
