Political management is a broad and ever evolving field encompassing a number of activities in professional politics

Politics

Politics is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions. The term is generally applied to the art or science of running governmental or state affairs, including behavior within civil governments, but also applies to institutions, fields, and special interest groups such as the...

. The field includes campaign management

Campaign manager

A campaign manager is a paid or volunteer individual, whose role is to coordinate the campaign's operations such as fundraising, advertising, polling, getting out the vote , and other activities supporting the effort, directly.Apart from the candidate, they are often a campaign's most visible leader...

 and consulting, advertisement

Campaign advertising

'In politics, campaign advertising is the use of an advertising campaign through newspapers, radio commercials, television commercials, etc.) to influence the decisions made for and by groups. These ads are designed by political consultants and the political campaign staff...

  creation/purchasing, grassroots

Grassroots

A grassroots movement is one driven by the politics of a community. The term implies that the creation of the movement and the group supporting it are natural and spontaneous, highlighting the differences between this and a movement that is orchestrated by traditional power structures...

 politics, opposition research

Opposition research

Opposition research is:# The term used to classify and describe efforts of supporters or paid consultants of a political candidate to legally investigate the biographical, legal or criminal, medical, educational, financial, public and private administrative and or voting records of the opposing...

 , issue advocacy, lobbying

Lobbying

Lobbying is the act of attempting to influence decisions made by officials in the government, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying is done by various people or groups, from private-sector individuals or corporations, fellow legislators or government officials, or...

, fundraising

Campaign finance

Campaign finance refers to all funds that are raised and spent in order to promote candidates, parties or policies in some sort of electoral contest. In modern democracies such funds are not necessarily devoted to election campaigns. Issue campaigns in referendums, party activities and party...

 , and polling

Opinion poll

An opinion poll, sometimes simply referred to as a poll is a survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of questions and then extrapolating generalities in ratio or within confidence...

. Some consider political management to be an applied form of political science

Political science

Political Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...

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History

Political managers first emerged during the early 20th century as American politics drifted away from party-centered politics towards an atmosphere focusing more on the individual candidates. Candidates began to hire their own staff to manage strategic decisions, fundraise, and handle the day-to-day campaign activities. Initially corporate public relations firms were hired to manage campaigns. However, eventually public relations firms specializing in political campaigns began to surface during the 1950s and 60s. One of the first professionals to be labeled a “political consultant” was Joseph Napolitan

Joseph Napolitan

Joseph Napolitan is an American political consultant, who worked as a general consultant on over 100 political campaigns in the United States, and many others throughout the world...

 who went on to found the American Association for Political Consultants. Eventually consultants specializing in specific aspects of the campaign began to grow in popularity, like, Tony Schwartz

Tony Schwartz

Anthony Schwartz was an American sound archivist, sound designer, pioneering media theorist and advertising creator...

, the creator of the now infamous “Daisy” ad, and one of the first media consultants to specialize in political campaigns. After media, polling was one of the first services sought out by campaign managers, followed by direct mail. Today, political managers specialize in a wide range of consulting areas including strategy, polling, direct mail, fundraising, web design, lobbying, and get out the vote efforts.

Educational Opportunities

Several universities offer graduate degrees in political management and applied politics. Some well known degree programs include The Graduate School of Political Management at The George Washington University, the Campaign Management Institute at American University

American University

American University is a private, Methodist, liberal arts, and research university in Washington, D.C. The university was chartered by an Act of Congress on December 5, 1892 as "The American University", which was approved by President Benjamin Harrison on February 24, 1893...

, the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron

University of Akron

The University of Akron is a coeducational public research university located in Akron, Ohio, United States. The university is part of the University System of Ohio. It was founded in 1870 as a small college affiliated with the Universalist Church. In 1913 ownership was transferred to the City of...

, and the Political Campaigning Program at the University of Florida

University of Florida

The University of Florida is an American public land-grant, sea-grant, and space-grant research university located on a campus in Gainesville, Florida. The university traces its historical origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its present Gainesville campus since September 1906...

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