Partisan Priorities investigates issue ownership, showing that American political parties deliver neither superior performance nor popular policies on the issues they 'own'.

Patrick J. Egan is Assistant Professor of Politics and Public Policy at New York University. He is co-editor of Public Opinion and Constitutional Controversy (with Nathaniel Persily and Jack Citrin, 2008). Partisan Priorities is based on his dissertation, which won the Carl Albert Award for best dissertation in legislative studies from the Legislative Studies Section of the American Political Science Association. In 2012, Professor Egan won the NYU Golden Dozen Award in recognition for his outstanding contribution to learning in the classroom. Before entering academia, he served as an Assistant Deputy Mayor of Policy and Planning in the office of Philadelphia mayor Edward Rendell.

1. Introduction; 2. Consensus issues: amidst polarization, shared goals; 3. The measure and meaning of issue ownership; 4. Ruling out the policy and performance hypotheses; 5. Partisan priorities: the source of issue ownership; 6. How issue ownership distorts American politics; 7. Conclusion.