Polarized America Summary

Because culture conflicts sells, journalism in our country has taken to publicizing exaggerated culture differences. Extreme voices have come to dominate American political discourse which has only fed into the concept of a divided country, even making it look like one half of our country hates the other half. The culture divide is based on party differences between republicans and democrats. In reality the cultural differences between democrats and republicans are far less dramatic than I would have guessed. Party affiliation is based on factors like age, Youth are generally more likely to vote liberal and the older generation more likely to vote conservative. Religion, protestants usually vote republican and catholics usually vote democrat. Economic status, historically this has meant wealthy individuals vote republican.The fact that about 2/3rd of voters vote for the party of their parent seems to be the most definite determiner of party affiliation . (Hewson, Jacqueline) Real differences in political opinion is very subtle accross party lines. For example in many ways red and blue states have similar opinions. In blue states 36% of voters identify as democrat while in red states 26% are self proclaimed democrats. In blue states 32% of voters believe government is always wasteful and inefficient while in red states 44% hold this opinion. Solid majorities in both red and blue states support protecting the environment whatever it may

In the book, Culture War?, by Morris Fiorina, the myth of a polarized America is exposed. Fiorina covers issues such as why Americans believe that America is polarized, that Red and Blue State people aren’t as different as they are made out to be, and that the United States is not polarized along traditional cleavage lines. This book even covers perspectives on abortion, homosexuality, and whether or not electoral cleavages have shifted. A large point of Fiorina’s is his take on the 2004 election. He ends the book with, how did our great nation get to this position of proclaimed polarization, and how do we improve from here?

Political polarization becomes apparent. Support among republicans drops 14% since 2014, while democratic opinion drops only 1%. The conservative wing of the Republican party sees the highest opposition at 57% (Henderson 9)

This creates a paradox for the reader. In a book designed to remove the impression of polarity, why single out specific subjects in this polarizing way? The logical conclusion is that these topics do have a specific effect on refuting the polarization claim. In the opening chapters, Fiorina et al. illustrate the perceived polarization of partisans, the war in Iraq, and a myriad of other factors like gun control (p. 1-75). With partisanship they found the issue to be a problem of “confusing positions with choice” (2011, p. 25) and thus dismissing the polarization of Americans. Analyzing he war in Iraq yielded similar results (p. 51-55). The authors found that when asked to judge broad statements, like Bush’s handling of Iraq, respondents answered in the partisan way, with more republicans supporting and democrats disapproving (p. 54). However, when the same people were asked to rate Bush’s handling of Iraq in terms of individual acts, the polarization faded (p. 52-53). While there were still dissidents and supporters, the divide was not along partisan lines but rather individual lines, evidenced by the near equal support of republicans and democrats for the use of military force overseas. All of this supports the argument that Fiorina et al. make throughout but provides no insight into why some topics are grouped

Abramowitz’s argument that the American electorate have become more polarized and that the moderate center is disappearing is more of a quantitative argument than a qualitative one. Based on election studies and exit polls, Abramowitz’ observations include the correlation between engagement, party identification, religious and social groups, ideological realignment, and education on the idealization and polarization of the public. Contrary to Fiorina, “there is no disconnect between the political elite and the American people. Polarization in Washington reflects polarization within the public, especially within the politically engaged segment of the public” (Abramowitz 2010, x). According to the ANES (American National Election Studies), the

"Over the past 30 to 40 years, growing partisan polarization...has been driven by generational replacement as new entrants evinced greater party-issue constraint than did

In Chapter eight it is discussed that the 2004 election was based on the leadership role of George W. Bush and not the moral values that people believe made him president again. In chapter nine it shows that the polarization of partisan elites can give the appearance that many voters are shifting emphasis from economics to religion and morality, even while voter preferences stay completely stable. In the last chapter Fiorina discusses how extreme voices have come to dominate American political discourse. Overall I believe that it just depends who you ask about it, if they believe if Americans are polarized or not because all Americans can only choose between the alternatives offered by the

Partisanship is defined in The American Voter “as both a set of beliefs and feelings that culminate in a sense of “psychological attachment” to a political party. It is one of the most important factors affecting the American political system. It explains, to some extent, vote choice, political engagement, partisan reasoning, and the influence of partisan elites. This definition generates two competing views of partisanship, the instrumental and expressive perspectives. This debate is what

James Campbell’s book is a political masterpiece that outlines how American voters are divided across the United States. Campbell provides a totally new perspective on the polarization with a historically context on how and why voters are politically divided. Campbell’s argument may seem indirect, but he provides circumstantial evidence and empirical evidence to support his claim of polarization. Polarized is significant to understanding American polarization, and surprisingly other books fail in comparison due to their lack of empirical evidence. Campbell’s book was written in 2016 which provides updated information that can help explain the cause of 2018 election polarization among voters.

When you observe the graph that the American National Election Studies has created, you begin to notice a pattern. This pattern would be that there was either an increase or decrease in the strength of the people's partisanship for each party around the time that a new president came into office. It seems that every single time that there was a change in the political leader of our country that people either felt very strong partisanship or very little. This must have to do with the idea that with each new president, the new issues arising in the country will be handled a certain way. Furthermore, how said issues are handled by those in office affect the partisanship. These new issues

The gaps have grown larger between Republicans and Democrats based on fundamental political beliefs. America’s two political parties have become so divided that it has come to be known as polarization. Divided government has been extremely common after World War II. Political polarization has increased intensely since the New Deal in the 1930s. The New Deal coalition emerged during the 1932 presidential election and had launched a partisan realignment in American politics, allowing the Democrats to become the majority party in US Politics.

There are many theories as to how or why political polarization was formed, and the impact it has on government in modern day. Polarization has varied significantly over the years ever since the 1970’s. However, what is the true cause and can it be explained? This paper will discuss some theories on how political polarization came about, and analyzes some accounts of polarization overall. Defining political polarization is vital into developing an understanding of how or why it was initially formed.

With polarization, people vote for clear ideologies where they don’t necessarily agree with all of the party’s stances. Thus, they are picking the lesser of two evils.

Fiorina progress with this question if Americans are truly polarized as many would them to be, answering with demographics and statistics where certain groups actually voted against what was expected of them. Fiorina uses these as examples and many other to illustrate how sociological factors have little to do with political leanings. The Iraq War is analyzed where many Americans share the same idea of foreign policy, varying only in overall performance of President Bush in the Iraq War (Fiorina 51-53). The measure of moderates is then discussed, where National Election Studies from 1972 and onward indicate many American do not identify with any political party (Fiorina

In this paper I will discuss the matter of the two-party system and the issue of polarization of thought in America. With the system under which we live, political and moral thought is limited by political identity in that individual’s ideas must conform entirely to their thought of their political party otherwise they would be discredited. Non-conformist thought is seen as immoral because to lean too far onto the side of the opposing political party is extremely frowned upon as the other side is seen as immoral. Additionally, each political party is polarized in that the ideals of the party that are presente a the governmental level are extreme, whereas the political ideas of individuals may not be. Because of this, we are only shown the polarized