This thesis has studied black politics in the City of Muncie, Indiana, in light of Imamu Baraka's concept of developing black politics. Baraka says that, of necessity, black politics is moving from a system of nominal jobs and services via a "brokerage" system toward a strong black institution with the ability to exert a black influence on the local political scene.In order to determine where Muncie fits into this notion of black politics two hypotheses were developed. First, voting patterns in three black precincts were studied to establish whether bloc voting exists there. In order to discover whether the existence of bloc voting results in black voters having impact on local politics, impact was operationalized to mean the appointment of blacks to administrative positions within the city administration and the feelings of political leaders and black community leaders toward the impact of black citizens on Muncie politics.Voting results from the 1967, 1971 and 1975 mayoral primary and general elections were studied. The particular three precincts studied were chosen because their population is more than 70 percent black.

This study examined gender differences in vote choice, made consequential by the recent emergence of a gender gap in support for Republican candidates. Explanations of the gender gap have included the following: 1)Self-interest explanations emphasizing women's greater dependence on social services and women's support of women's issues. 2)Socialization explanations emphasizing women's more pacifist attitudes.Data for the study came from a random sample of "Middletown." Variables in the analysis included Feminism, Social Traditionalism, the Ethic of Care, support for Child Care and support for Dukakis. In order to explore gender differences in voting behavior, analyses for vote choice were done for women and men, seperately. Path analyses of women's and men's support for Social Traditionalism, child care, and Dukakis are presented in the paper. / Department of Sociology