A couple of months ago, I wrote a long piece here about how British voters, from having been two rather distinct groups of people, with different beliefs and habits and social characteristics and consumer tastes, were converging into a single much-harder-to-distinguish lump, which both major political parties will shun their traditional supporters (the two old separate lumps) to appeal to. Hence the new “political class”, and hence the new electoral landslides won by Thatcher, Blair, and now soon (it looks more and more likely) Cameron.
I didn’t mention the USA, but I have long had the sense that something opposite is happening over there, with a more homogeneous population being replaced by two much more distinct social groups. Well, what do I know? I’ve never even been there. But now Terry Teachout has recently done a piece for Commentary called America Sorts Itself, arguing pretty much exactly this, writing about books that paint the same picture.
But the change in the political landscape goes deeper than that. Today, a voter’s decision to support one candidate over another may well have little to do with that candidate’s positions on specific issues. It is, rather, an ideological fashion statement, a declaration that one is a certain kind of person, whose tastes on a wide variety of cultural matters can be reliably inferred from his political preferences – and vice-versa. “If you drive a Volvo and do yoga, you are pretty much a Democrat,” said Ken Mehlman, who managed President Bush’s 2004 presidential campaign. “If you drive a Lincoln or a BMW and you own a gun, you’re voting for Bush.”
The now-familiar phrases “latte liberal” and “NASCAR conservative” are expressions of this development. …
Teachout quotes a University of Texas sociologist saying this:
the number of counties where one party or another has a landslide majority has doubled over the past quarter-century. Whole regions are now solidly Democratic or Republican. Nearly three-quarters of us … live in counties that are becoming less [politically] competitive, and many of us find ourselves living in places that are overwhelmingly liberal or overwhelmingly conservative.
I certainly have the feeling that the “latte liberal” objection to the war in Iraq is not that it is a bad war, but that a hated gun-owning, evangelical Christian cowboy conservative is running it. Were President Obama to take charge of this war, and decide to press ahead with it pretty much indefinitely, the latte liberals would then be quite content, or such is my suspicion. The NASCAR conservatives, on the other hand …
Two questions. First, obviously, is this notion of much more socially divided and regionally sorted USA true? And second, if it is more or less true, what impact with that have both on the USA’s political system, and on the world?
One of Teachout’s answers to the local USA part of the second of those questions is that US politics is becoming less gentlemanly, because voters and (perhaps even more importantly) politicians on different sides don’t mix with and know each other as much and as well as they used to. They are thus quicker to attribute dishonourable motives and mentalities to one another, as, now, are younger presidential candidates like Obama and Huckabee. The USA, Teachout says, is becoming harder to govern as a single political entity. This may not be such a bad thing, but it will surely have consequences, and not just in the USA.
As a coda, it is perhaps relevant to add that whenever any of us Brit Samizdatistas writes anything bad about Britain or British political trends, as we do quite often of course, as likely as not some US commenter will say: Give up on Britain, mate. Move here. And by “here” he doesn’t just mean the USA, he means one of the good bits of it. I have no inclination whatever thus to move, being very content in London thanks very much. I find these calls to give up on my own country insulting. But maybe such comments are part of the process described above, and maybe some people, especially within the USA, find such appeals persuasive. It would seem so. Such anecdotage certainly points up the way that improved communication reinforces such a process of sorting by political preference, simply by making choosing and moving easier to do and to organise. I am, of course, wholly in favour of people being allowed to do this kind of thing.
Such appeals also hint at a possible future for the entire world, of geographical sorting, along distinctly political and sociological lines, rather than just organised according to the mere accident of where you happened to be born.
Brian, you really should go to the States. Starting in New York, working down the coast and then travelling across the country and finishing in the wine country of northern California and then zip down to Mexico.
I have visited the nation dozens of times and yet I would not claim to have an accurate handle on what the locals think. You’d love it. Get out there.
Hmm. I think what’s happening is that western electorates are being sorted, or squeezed, into two camps. The first are those who buy into the “progressive consensus” (big government, transnationalist one-worldism etc), the second group are defined exclusively simply as those who don’t buy into that, a motley collection of conservatives, religionists, libertarians etc who resist the (seeminly inevitable) drive towards eh elitist non-nationalist technocracy or whatever. Group B there are thrashing around looking to find some political representation which is increasingly hard to find, for instance the choice of Obama or McCain gives them nobody to vote for at all. Here in the former UK, none of the 3 major parties offer them anything either, which is why there is a surge for the likes of the BNP, just because the BNP oppose the “consensus”.
The intention of the proggies for the past century has been to squeeze every other view out of the political sphere, and we’ve now reached the stage where they’ve broadly succeeded, and those who oppose them now toddle around looking in desperation for a candidate who offers some glimmer of being a little less progressive than the other one. That’s the polarisation. It’s effectively insiders and outsiders. The insiders get a range of similar candidates to vote for, and the outsiders don’t get anybody. The Republicans are way to the “left” of what most of their supporters want to vote for and only get support for being a bit less left than the Democrats (and having a certain amount of Christian appeal).
I would not presume to speak on behalf of my countrymen, but invitations to relocate are not meant to be insulting.
That is our existential purpose; whether all the socialist, New Dealish, nappy-wearing statutes have ruined these here 57 States’ value as a refuge is another question entirely.
Perhaps you should not be so hard on your correspondents. Those of us who move from a blue-ish Northern state to the deep red of Texas (as I did, for example), see little difference between that and move from London to Houston. The catharsis is the same and probably so is the ultimate satisfaction.
No insult is intended, just an expression of Anglophone connection, well supported by a large number of English ex-pats hereabouts.
I would not presume to speak on behalf of my countrymen, but invitations to relocate are not meant to be insulting.
But they are nonetheless.
While I have reluctantly given up on Britain, good on you for finding the suggestion insulting. Fighting for the values that made your country great is more than worthy. And we across the pond may be (I hope) underestimating the British ability to recover from the long slide into……whatever it is.
But do come visit the US! It’s so damn big that there’s plenty of room for extreme divisions. People in New Hampshire gave up on the People’s Republic of Massachusetts long ago. Texans think Yankees are rude poofters, and equivalent opinion flows the other way. Like several different countries united by a common dislike of their national leaders. Or something.
PS. Why no posts on the recent legalization of self-defense in UK? Is it a sham?
Depends upon if you want to dwell on the differences that divide people or the similarities that unite them.
Some of us live in places that we love for various reasons that have nothing to do with politics, and take the differences in peoples’ worldviews in stride. A small town in these parts of the southwestern US has legislated against same-sex relationships as well as the wearing of thong bikinis (they wanted to ban all bikinis at the local pool but community outrage forced them to scale back to just thongs) in public. I disagree with these laws, and I can appreciate the fact that I can grab a bite to eat when traveling through, and visit friends there, while choosing to not live in the city limits of that town with its goofy laws.
As a yoga-doing gun totin’ libertarian-living individual, I’ve got something in common with people from both sides of the political spectrum.
I do find it more difficult to find a decent political discussion where one party does not get huffy with the respectful challenge of ideas and refuse to engage. It is heady, though, when an exchange can happen and within a few days of thinking about it both parties can acknowledge that they have appreciated the discussion and as a result have been able to see a different slant on a point or two.
I don’t think the division is any worse than it has ever been in the US, from what I remember as a kid in the ’50’s and ’60’s til now. It is being hammered in the media as a big deal, sowing divisive discontent, and with the newer phenomenon of the internet where people can nurture their resentments with others of like mind, the misperception is that division is a new phenomenon. The failure to heed history, along with ‘the media is the massage’
The Social Historian Gertrude Himmelfarb collected her writings on this issue in the U.S., begun as far back as 1996, and extended them in an incisive small text:
One Nation, Two Cultures (Knopf, 1999). It merits another read these days.
In a number of U.S states that register voters by party affiliations, the identification ‘independent” now exceeds that of either party and reportedly exceeds the total of both parties in at least one state so far.
What Brian notes should not be a surprising development in the increasingly plebiscitory form of representative governance in both nations.
J.P. –
Depending on what one wants to understand of the composite “culture” and attitudes in the U.S., a different itinerary might be in order.
In the East, go first (Atlanta via air) to Georgia and the Carolinas; the smaller cities, then inland to the “heartland” with a dip into the Southwest (make it brief?) Then the Pacific Northwest, Northern Calif. briefly into LaLa land, then last of all back out through NY and possibly New England. If you want to know “America,” NY and California are not the places for cogent observations. Think of what those populations are caught up in their daily doing.
A trip for diversion might have different objectives satisfied by what you suggest.
Sam S wrote:
Yeah, but they’re turning New Hampshire into another Massachusetts.
I can see assortative migration as a possibility in the United States. For example, my cohabitant’s brother and sister-in-law moved from San Diego to Dallas a number of years ago, specifically so that they could raise their children in a Christian environment (where “Christian” means Biblical literalist morally conservative Republican). On the other hand, when I was talking with her sister-in-law a few weeks ago about the rising costs of housing in San Diego during the bubble, she quite spontaneously sad that my cohabitant and I would not find Texas a comfortable environment—and I’m quite ready to believe that she’s right. California is a sadly over-regulated place, but it’s as close as I can get to living in a post-Christian cultural milieu in the United States, and that’s important to me.
On the other hand, now that their kids are growing up—one out of college, one finishing her last year, one in high school—they have bought property a few miles up the coast and are spending increasing time there, to be closer geographically to their inlaws on the other side. So in some measure personal ties are trumping cultural values for them.
A quick question for our US readers;
Does
gerrymanderingre-districting play much of a part in this?I’ve never understood the system of registering voters by party affiliation.
One can join a party voluntarily, of course.
But whether one does that or not, surely the correct response to being asked by a government official which party you support is, ‘None of your business.’
Paerhaps a US resident can explain.
I too have visited the USA many times and liked it a lot, but its lack of homogeneity seemed remarkable to me.
Of course it’s very big, and there is room.
I find it almost absurd that “The United States” is a single nation. I traveled a lot as a kid — Dad being in the Air Force — and even more as an adult: thirty-one years of rock-show touring means I’ve seen just about every nook and cranny in fifty states. From here to there and everywhere in this country, the cultural differences among American geographies are often as vivid as anything in Europe, possibly excepting for the language but that’s often very remarkable in this context, too.
Think about “The United States”. These days, you hear politicians and other mouthy twits rattling on about “unity”. Of course, this is part & parcel of the entire socialist theme, but it also has a most unfortunate aspect in its standing in the American political heritage. It’s a long-bone in our political lexicon. What’s grievously unfortunate is that the only thing about American politics that “united” this country was dying lip-service (known as “the Constitution”) to the ideals originally set forth in the Declaration of Independence. It was the essential idea of freedom that was the object of the “union” — no matter how badly it was served, ever after.
No socialist idea was ever a part of that, and this is the ghastly perversion of the concept of “union” that we face now: the socialists have something in mind that is simply not American. When they talk about “unity”, they are not talking about agreement on fidelity to the idea of freedom. They’re talking about a hive.
But the word “union” has such a grand American ring to it, doesn’t it?
The “sort” is inevitable, I think. This is because of the political dynamics of collectivism. As every individual life becomes more and more subject to cannibal-pot ethics, it becomes more and more necessary to get into the political fight, for sheer survival. In the very nature of things, this means herding: join a gang or get thrown to one.
The essential political conflict of our time is between collectivism and individualism. Very few people can see the thing in those truest terms, and this is why most individuals’ practical politics can’t be distinguished to precisely one or the other of those two sides: the nice lady who wants free meds doesn’t know “socialism” from a tuna sandwich, and the gun-toting farmer usually has only the dimmest concepts of “rights” or the implications of his stand on weapons. They don’t know the fullest context or implications of their politics. However, the power of principles does not diminish from ignorance.
Very roughly, the “sort” is taking place along the individualist/collectivist divide. It has all kinds of distortions (for instance: instinctive individualists joining pressure groups — e.g., NRA) compounded by cultural geography, etc., but I say that what you’re really seeing is the last stand of the American idea.
I’ve said it before: all politics in my country now is dress rehearsal for civil war.
Or: “Politics is war by other means.”
The socialists might eventually achieve the “unity” they want. It’s going to be right bloody hell — one way or another — in doing it.
Bodman –
In several states, the “primaries” are conducted through the state administered systems.
You can select in which you will participate, or be uncommited until you cast that ballot. Some states have “open” primaries.
So, most don’t find it offputting to identify by affiliation if they want to, but don’t have to.
Billy Beck
Points out a perception that is somewhat closer than most casual visitors seeking diversion rather than to experience the reality of the country will achieve.
But, there is differentiation – yes; still that is not division.
The counterculture of the late 60s did establish an imprint that has been slowly absorbed, and the fierceness of the “drawing away” of those then in their late teens and early twenties who are now in 50s and 60s has long ago ebbed, and has not continued with their offspring.
Americans still have more empathy for than envy of their fellow Americans. There is no standardized method of expressing it, but it is there. That, and not politics, is the uniting force of the American people.
In that condition, “Solidarity” has no function.
Of course, that cuts both ways.
Where are the real Conservatives, who during Clinton’s term said things like:
* We are not the worlds’ policemen!
* Occupation is a sucker bet!
* Americans pay taxes to protect America, not Bosnia
* Nation-Building is not a job for the military
* Nation-Building is not a job for America
* We should not pay for their mistakes
I miss them. I wish they were not blinded by having a Big Government Republican in the white house, instead of a Big Government Democrat.
Yes. A libertarian friend of mine ran as a Republican in Wisconsin’s 2nd congressional district in 2000. He lost in a squeaker to Tammy Baldwin, arch far left liberal.
After that race, well, I’ll let this guy explain it.
Kevin B anticipated an observation I was planning to make: a significant reason that so many political jurisdictions are heavily skewed toward Republican or Democrat (that’s the only two flavors we have) is gerrymandering. Whichever party gets into power re-draws the district lines to consolidate its base and guarantee its re-election. In fact, often the party which is out of power gets to participate in the game by negotiating “safe” districts for itself; that way it gets at least some representation. So to the extent Teachout is using this as evidence of his “sorting” hypothesis I think it’s misguided.
Also, just because a district has been gerrymandered to favor one polical party doesn’t mean that there aren’t significant differences of opinion within that party. We just have to use means other than political labels to identify them. If you have to be a Republican to be elected in my county, than everyone who wants to win will have an “R” by his name, personal political philsophy notwithstanding. Ultimately, this vitiates the meaning of the name and the value of the label, as the political spectrum represented within the party becomes ever broader. The same thing is happening in both parties, and when you get to the federal level the area of overlap is huge. In my opinion this, more than anything, is the source of a heightened level of campaign acrimony: there is so little real difference between the two parties that it’s just about the only way for candidates to distinguish themselves. The stakes have gotten higher (with ever more power finding its way to Washington) and the differences smaller.
With all due respect to Billy Beck, I just don’t see that there are enough “individualists” in the country for it to amount to a “division” along that line. Everyone is a “collectivist”, it’s just that our “collectives” are all different. The federal government is a giant piñata; we send representatives to Washington to give it a whack so goodies fall out. Sure, we gripe about taxes, but we don’t want to lose our federally-subsidized flood insurance or Mom’s Medicaid benefits. If there’s rioting in the streets, it won’t be freedom activists opposed to Big Government; it will be when government collapses of its own weight and we’re not getting our Social Security checks. (See, I’m just as pessimistic as he is, just in a different way!)
By the way, I wouldn’t presume to advise anyone to leave his country. But if you should take the advice of several contributors and visit the US, and happen to find yourself in South Carolina, please look me up.
“With all due respect to Billy Beck, I just don’t see that there are enough ‘individualists’ in the country for it to amount to a “division” along that line.”
They don’t know what they are to that extent of definition, Laird. Observe the word “instinctive”. That means that they do not explicitly sort through their premises enough to know what they’re doing to that extent. I am not talking about philosophical categories which are that distinct in the minds of the average votist out there: they’re not thinking them through that far. And this fact accounts for the cheating that you point out, as well as the general inclinations in each direction.
Declaring an affiliation is voluntary.
If you’re affiliated with a party, you get to vote in its primary elections and participate in its caucuses. Refusing to declare an affiliation means that you can’t. However, as an unaffiliated voter you’re still perfectly able to vote in general elections, local elections, etc. You just can’t be a part of how the party picks its candidates without declaring yourself to be part of the party.
Or at least that’s how it’s done in one state. Each state is going to be just a little bit different from the next.
This election cycle is the first time in my life that I’ve declared an affiliation, even though I’ve been a voter since Billy Jeff’s first term.
If you’re affiliated with a party, you get to vote in its primary elections and participate in its caucuses.
Yeah, OK, but: Still, why is it any of the state’s business? If my grandma’s Scrabble club decides to pick officers, it does it on its time and accord. The club doesn’t need Grandma telling the state, “I’m a member of Ethyl’s Scrabble club, so now you can let me vote in our proceedings.”
The government codification of party administration is a big — and often overlooked — reason why American politics has gotten stuck where it is. The two parties are essentially sanctified and set into place by such. If the group of people who gather under the umbrella “Democrats” want to hold primaries and pick candidates and who-knows-what-else, let THEM do it, and let them figure out who should be involved. It is, quite literally, nobody else’s business.
In a perfect world you would be right, Tom, but that’s not the one we live in. There has to be some mechanism for determining who gets to vote for the party nominees, and as long as the state runs the major-party primaries (which is the way it works in every state with which I am familiar) registration by party is probably the best way to do it.
My state (South Carolina) is an open-primary state, which means that it works just about as you suggest it should: there is no registration by party, and you can select which party’s primary you want to vote in when you show up at the polling place. I think that’s wrong. If you’re going to help determine a party’s selection of nominees you should be a member of the “club”, which at least means feeling sufficiently connected to it that you’re willing to identify yourself as such. (My preference would be that you be an actual dues-paying, card-carrying member, but most people seem to think that’s going too far.) If you don’t want to be affiliated with a party, fine, but you don’t get invited to their events.
The Libertarian Party and other minor parties select nominees by convention; anyone can attend, but only delegate get a vote and only party members can be delegates. Major-party primaries should work the same way. Everyone gets to vote in the general election, but only partisans (in the true meaning of that word) get to select nominees.
as long as the state runs the major-party primaries…
Well, that was my ultimate point: That’s the problem. Why is the state running “major party primaries” in the first place? The state is not involved in administering the elections that take place within my grandma’s bridge club — why is it involved in the elections that take place within these arbitrary groups?
But because it is, it codifies the existence of these two groups. Which makes them not-arbitrary. Which sets them into place and — as we can clearly see — makes them damn-near immovable.
Let the “Democratic Party” and “Republican Party” and whoever figure out on their own who they’re going to offer as candidates in the ONE set of elections that should be administered by the state. There’s no reason for government apparatus to be involved in their internal processes.
Sorry, I think I pulled a metaphor bait-and-switch. It was my grandma’s Scrabble club that was being spotlighted. Not her bridge club. She doesn’t even like bridge. She could kick all our asses in Scrabble, however.
Personally, I much prefer Bridge to Scrabble. Anyway, I agree with you that the state shouldn’t be running primaries, but that’s the way it is and it ain’t gonna change. In fact, in SC in this last legislative session the state appropriated funds specifically for that purpose (previously the two parties had to reimburse the state for at least some of the costs). Incidentally, there is also talk about switching to closed primaries, where you have to be registered in the party prior to voting. Personally, I approve.
Regarding gerrymandering, I was also alert for that issue when reading the story. The key point is that the “more landslides” phenomenon is seen in a county-by-county measure, not just a district-by-district measure. Redistricting changes election district boundaries every ten years. Country boundaries almost never change. So this sorting is real.
It may also be indirectly driven in part by gerrymandering. Gerrymandered districts favor more partisan extremists. (They also vastly favor incumbents, which is why incumbents love to draw them.) If your politicians are going to be more extremist, its even more important to be in a compatible district.
I’ve been thinking about gerrymandering informally ever since reading a book in the mid-1980’s about the California 1980 redistricting, and had several anti-gerrymandering ideas. My current favorite idea (which is not to say the best idea) would really just work for Colorado and maybe Wyoming. Divide the state into equal-sized population districts, with the dividing lines being only lattitude or longitude lines spanning the state. State and Federal Representative districts would all be long North-South rectangles (on a Mercator projection) and State Senate districts would all be long East-West rectangles. They key point is to eliminate degrees of freedom that allow potential gerrymanderers to play their game.
While I agree with the argument that having the State government running the party primaries is entangling and a barrier to entry for competitors, it does have a rational basis. The State government needs the equipment, infrastructure and organization to run elections. A State-wide party primary needs the same stuff. It makes sense for the Parties to piggy-back on what the State government is already doing. Indeed, the recent California primaries included primary elections for all the parties, plus elections on State initiatives, all voted on for much less cost than running these separately. One could have the State charge the parties for the service of hosting their primaries, but the cost to the state is pretty much the same, and if the state charged the corresponding flat fee per party, that could be an even bigger barrier to small parties.
I personally think that instead of dividing into two separate parties, the US is dividing into two separate “teams”. Like any good football/basketball/baseball team they operate under the same rules and work towards the same goal. And except for the color wear the same uniforms.
So really one party, but two enthusiastic, diametrically opposed teams who will sing their teams praises no matter what.
The rest who think that small government, personal responsibility, individual liberty are good things will have to find a different game to play.