Why have recent political victories— both Republican and Democrat— been so short-lived? It may be because voter support varies when it comes to long-term policy stances vs current cultural and identity issues.
The Study's Findings
Jeremy Pope, Wheatley Fellow and co-director of the Cooperative Election Study, conducted a study with Professor Michael Barber, director of the Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy at Brigham Young University, to delve into the issue.
"Each party now faces a different kind of mismatch between its coalition and the positions it routinely emphasizes," the two men write. The Republican party, on average, is more successful at uniting its members around new culture and identity issues, while struggling to agree on longer-term policy decisions. Democrats face the opposite problem. "Their voters are comparatively unified on longstanding economic issues... [b]ut Democrats are divided on identity and culture issues, especially by race."
Strategic Implications
In short, Pope and Barber say, "...neither party’s voters are uniformly behind its full issue package."
The parties' respective strengths and weaknesses play heavily into election strategy. "Democrats want elections centered on economic policy, while Republicans want contests about identity and culture," the two researchers write. "Each party can win when U.S. politics moves onto its own terrain. But neither party can keep things there for long, because in our political environment parties do not control the agenda by themselves."
Read the full article on Good Authority.
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