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GIS for political campaigns and elections and/or public affairs

JimWooten

Hello All,

I may also be teaching a political science course for the fall 2024 and/or Spring 2025 semester. I’d like to focus the course on the use of GIS in campaigns and elections and/or public affairs. Maybe fundraising as well. Can anyone recommend a textbook or an appropriate syllabus for use in the course? I checked the ESRI Press site and I didn't find anything suitable. This would be for a university's undergraduate political science department so a text is preferred but an appropriate reading list would also be helpful. I might need to make sure the students can work with Pro and Online if that helps. Thanks for any help or guidance.

Jim

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BobBooth1

You might find some of the resources here helpful:

https://learn.arcgis.com/en/gallery/#?q=district&t=lesson

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SaraJL

@JimWooten I would be curious on what you find out! I work pretty frequently with groups that are doing research or study that is political science related (I myself also have a background in both political science and GIS). I work in IT at a college currently as an academic/instructional technologist that supports GIS coursework

I will also agree with you that's it's been really difficult to find texts on this type of topic - especially ones that are more based in the humanities side and not just statistical analysis. Not that analyzing voting doesn't involve stats, but in my experience - the stats texts focus only on the numbers part and validating if things are right/wrong/significant but doesn't always tie back to how this relates to the population from a sociopolitical perspective.

If you have research librarians at your institution, I definitely recommend reaching out to them! I work with research librarians frequently on trying to find materials. They might have some recommendations of other resources to check!

JimWooten

Thanks, Sara. I'll keep you posted on what I find out. I would be an adjunct at this university so if and when I'm asked to teach, I'll definitely reach out the research librarians. That's a great suggestion. Also, as political campaigns resemble fundraising efforts by non-profits, especially early on, that's also a potential source of pedagogical material. I also reached out to Joseph Kerski, who you may know as a fantastic source for teaching in the GIS field.

JimWooten

Hi again SaraJL

Joseph Kerski reminded me that Ken Field's book "Thematic Mapping; 101 inspiring ways to visualize empirical data" contains many examples of how thematic mapping can be used to communicate election data. It should be helpful, especially for undergraduates.

BobBooth1

You might find some of the resources here helpful:

https://learn.arcgis.com/en/gallery/#?q=district&t=lesson

JimWooten

Thanks BobBooth1. Between the tutorials list you sent and Ken Field's book, and outside readings, I should be able to construct a decent syllabus. Also, Joseph Kerski reminded me that Business Analyst Web App is also a good source for voter and donor socioeconomic data. That can help with messaging.

Jim

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