US presidential hopefuls have been descending on the state of Iowa, pitching their political wares in the run-up to the first party caucuses of the year. The fight for their party's nomination is as fierce as the eventual fight for the White House itself. And voters are inundated with choose-me messages via every possible media.
The American political landscape can be a confusing one, but a new website created here in the Netherlands aims to give everyone - American or not - a chance to make an informed choice for their favoured candidate. It's called an electoral compass, and it's a short survey that compares visitors' answers with the policy statements of the major candidates.
Rest of the world
 Logo of Free University
|
While the big name candidates - such as Hilary Clinton or Barack Obama - get plenty of attention, often little is known about the policies of the less visible contenders, even within the US. The Electoral Compass aims to give people from Pakistan to Britain, Australia to the Netherlands, an easy way of finding out just what the different candidates stand for.
As Andre Krouwel says, US politics influence politics just about everywhere - so foreigners are interested in finding out what's being offered to American voters.
Database
 US Candidates: "...bewildering variety"
RNW's Reinout van Wagtendonk profiles a number of prominent candidates from both parties, such as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Also pictured above: Bill Richardson (right)  Rudy Giuliani, one of the Republican candidates
|
There are 10 serious candidates in the race for the US presidency, as well as another 9 who are showing up in the opinion polls. Mr. Krouwel and his team spent months researching all the different policy proposals before launching the site.
The answers visitors give to the survey questions will be compared with the policies of the 10 major candidates. And all the background information is available on the database, so it's possible to check why a candidate has been placed where he or she is, on a specific issue.
Critics of this kind of voting advice, say such a survey reduces a complex process to a few "hot-button" issues. But Mr. Krouwel points out that this is, in fact, how voters behave.
They cast their ballots on the basis of a few issues and a media-shaped idea of who a candidate is and what they stand for. Rather than reducing complexity, he says, the Electoral Compass will actually help voters make a better-informed and more rational choice at the ballot box.
The electoral compass judges all the candidates by the same standards - so using it means you will find the candidate whose policies genuinely do reflect your own views most closely. Something, which isn't always the case when voters are guided by advertising, "tele-visual" appeal, and campaigns which focus on the personal rather than the political.
The web address is www.electoralcompass.com.
Tags: caucus, compass, Dutch, electoral, Iowa, president, US, voting