THE 1992 UNITED-STATES NATIONAL ELECTION

Far from being inevitable, as it may now appear, Clinton's victory over Bush in the 1992 U.S. presidential election required a confluence of several largely unforeseen developments. For one, though the U.S. economy was recovering, sluggishly, in late 1991 and then more robustly in the election year itself, deep public pessimism about the economy's status developed nonetheless, leading to a vague but highly insistent call to 'Do something!' In addition, the independent candidacy of Ross Perot became especially injurious to the Bush campaign, because the Texas billionaire's attacks on the President appeared so disinterested. Perot cut deeply into the political and attitudinal groups that in recent elections have been giving generally strong support to Republican nominees. Despite these and other developments which led to Bush's defeat just 20 months after he had appeared dominant politically, however, the underlying political alignment of policy and social groups changed little in 1992.