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Jeffrey Bernstein, a political scientist at Eastern Michigan University, describes the central fact about congressional elections: incumbents are re-elected in overwhelming numbers. He also reviews how political scientists have explained this phenomenon and suggests ways for high school and college teachers to teach their students about incumbency. What follows is an excerpt from a simulation of congressional elections Bernstein created for CongressLink, a project conducted with a Robert H. Michel Civic Education Grant. Incumbency The first, and most central, fact we should know about congressional elections is the incumbency advantage (see the following section for useful tips on how to teach about incumbency). Simply put, what we mean by this is that incumbent members of Congress are at a great advantage when running for reelection; over time, incumbents are reelected close to 95% of the time. Some years, this figure climbs as high as 98%; in 1998, for example, 395 out of 403 incumbents who sought reelection were successful (seven lost in the general election and one lost his primary).
Approximate Word count = 607
Approximate Pages = 2.4
(250 words per page double spaced)
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