About Different Types of Voting

Series Summary

Politics is the process by which groups of people make decisions. The term is generally applied to behavior within civil governments, but politics has been observed in many human group interactions, including corporate, academic and religious institutions. Political science, or political studies, is the study of political behavior and examines the acquisition and application of power. In this free video series on politics and voting, an experienced political science professor explains how to register to vote in different states and how to hold office. Get information on how to become a senator or congressman. Find out how to start a ballot initiative with a petition and how to decide whether you are republican or democrat. Finally, get information on how to register to vote in Texas, California, Illinois and other states.

Video Transcript

"I'm Matthew Burbank. I'm an Associate Professor at the University of Utah and I would like to talk to you about different types of voting and what that refers to is the different kinds of elections in the United States. We have a large variety of elections. You are probably most familiar with Presidential elections because they tend to get the most attention but we also have elections for other federal offices such as the house and the senate and a variety of state and local offices such as governors, members of state House of Representatives, members of state senates, as well as a number of other local offices. Generally with Presidential elections what people tend to focus on are big national issues because Presidents tend to deal with matters of foreign policy and the economy, major national issues such as that. In states the elections often deal with similar issues but on a national or excuse me on a state scale. Very often what we are dealing with are issues such as education or the state economy or tax rates so very often those are the kinds of issues that are dealt with in local elections."