Are Campaign Consultants Valuable?

By ELLEN ZENG

Campaign consultants perform a Jekyll and Hyde role in electoral politics. On one hand, they make critical decisions that lead to election day victories, such as crafting the candidate-defining phrase describing President George W. Bush as the “compassionate conservative.” On the other hand, they use tactics that ultimately harm democracy, such as strategically arranging for voters to receive phone calls right before the election asking if they would “be more or less likely to vote for [Candidate X] if [they] knew her staff is dominated by lesbians?” Neither the glorifying view that campaign consultants are indispensable, “an essential part of election campaigns,” nor the vilifying view that they harm democracy can actually be arrived at without first analyzing how campaign consultants impact electoral politics and our democracy.

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