Components of party polarization in the US House of Representatives

Abstract

We specify the level of polarization in a two-party legislature as an explicit function of three factors: (1) the ideological heterogeneity of district median voters, (2) the distance between candidates of different parties in the same or ideologically comparable districts, and (3) partisan bias in choosing between candidates equidistant from the median voter. Our key empirical finding, reinforced by two alternative methods of calculation, is that, while changes in each factor have contributed to the present day extremely high level polarization in the US House of Representatives, at least 80% of the growth in that polarization from 1956 through 2008 can be attributed to a dramatic increase in the second of these factors: party differentiation at the district level.

Party positions over international human rights treaties in the United States in the Post-Cold War

“…According to Reilly (2004), as a unifying document for the Executive Branch, the security strategy is designed to create an internal consensus on the foreign strategy of defense, diplomacy, and economics. In the scope of this article, we analyze the NSS's published during the administrations of Bill Clinton (1994,1995,1996,1997,1998,1999,2000), George W. Bush , 2006), and Barack Obama (2010, 2015. The NSS should be transmitted annually since 1987, but frequently reports come in late or not at all for the decision of the Administration.…”

“…It is precisely at the domestic level that the decision to ratify international treaties occurs. In contrast to the favorable context of cooperation at the international level, the domestic context in the US has been marked since the late 1980s by the intensification of party polarization (BECKMANN, McGANN, 2008;BRUNELL et al, 2015;POOLE, ROSEN-THAL, 1997;RAGUSA, 2016;THERIAULT, 2006).…”

The Imperfect Beliefs Voting Model

“…Probabilistic voting 2 While the data on polarization and housing segregation referenced within this paper rely on time series at a national level, the results of, e.g., Brunell, Grofman and Merrill (2015), show that the increase in congressional polarization must be related in a strong way to within-district polarization, and hence a within-election explanation is necessary. models predict that voters whose sociocultural identity is tied to a party or candidate will actually be relatively ignored in terms of policy outcomes.…”

“…A sizable literature has emerged, reviewed by Fiorina, Abrams and Pope (2005) and McCarty et al (2006), questioning several potential explanations, such as a polarizing electorate, changes in electoral institutions, gerrymandering, and the rise of primary systems within the parties. At the least, it appears that there is still a substantial residual even controlling for these institutional changes: Fowler and Hall (2016) find that parties have diverged as much on salient issues as non-salient issues, while Brunell, Grofman and Merrill (2015) find that 80% of the increase in polarization must be explained by within-district polarization between candidates rather than increased partisan bias or sorting of voters. The model provides endogenous results consistent with the time-series evidence, showing that politicians have polarized as voters have begun sorting based on socioeconomic characteristics and as inequality has grown.…”