Macropartisanship: An Empirical Reassessment

Abstract

1 o evaluate the comparability of the Gallup and Michigan Survey Research Center measures for studying levels of partisanship among the U.S. electorate we compare the overtime distribution of partisanship and the correlates of partisanship using the results of Gallup surveys, the National Election Studies, and the General Social Surveys. Compared with the Gallup results, both the other two surveys reveal less shortterm variation and also less total variation. Compared with the Gallup results, the National Election Studies partisanship results are less related to short-term electoral outcomes and do not appear to be strongly driven by short-term economic and political evaluations. Our analyses suggest that scholars should be cautious about using Gallup results to revise conclusions based upon analyses that employ the Michigan Survey Research Center party identification measure.

Explaining Politics, Not Polls: Reexamining Macropartisanship with Recalibrated NES Data

“…Macropartisanship is less fluid and less sensitive to short-term forces than the uncorrected data had suggested. This lends support to the earlier findings of Abramson and Ostrom (1991) and Green, Palmquist, and Schickler (2002). The surveys were more sensitive to short-term forces than was the actual partisanship of the electorate.…”

“…Later research challenged the idea that partisanship was a fixed trait of voters and characterized it as endogenous, more of a "running tally" of the voter's evaluations of the parties than an immutable attachment (Jackson 1975;Fiorina 1981). As noted above, this debate about the stability of macropartisanship continues with Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson (2002) and Box-Steffensmeier and Smith (1996), emphasizing its changeability, and Abramson and Ostrom (1991) and Green, Palmquist, and Schickler (1998;2001, and) emphasizing its stability. NOTE.-Macropartisanship is computed as the percentage of partisans who identified with the Democratic party.…”

“…Both Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson (1989; and BoxSteffensmeier and Smith (1996) find macropartisanship to be quite changeable and sensitive to the recent performance of the parties. On the other hand, Abramson and Ostrom (1991) and Green, Palmquist, and Schickler (2002) find macropartisanship to be stable and largely insensitive to shortterm conditions. The second debate concerns the existence of long-term or realigning changes in macropartisanship.…”

“…In particular, do the known errors in aggregate turnout and vote choice appreciably affect the NES's aggregate measure of party identification, macropartisanship? Since there are well-established associations between the strength of party identification and the decision to turn out to vote, and between party identification and the vote choice at the individual level (Campbell et al 1960;Lewis-Beck et al 2008), and parallel associations between aggregate partisanship and both the national vote division (Converse 1966;Abramson and Ostrom 1991;Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2002) and turnout levels (Abramson and Aldrich 1982;Rosenstone and Hansen 2003), there are strong reasons to suspect that errors in the distribution of turnout and the presidential vote would also generate errors in the aggregate distribution of partisanship. More specifically, we should expect that whichever party is overrepresented in the presidential vote is also overrepresented in party identification, and that the general underrepresentation of nonvoters in NES data underrepresents weaker partisans and independents who are less likely to vote.…”

Unpacking the Black Utility Heuristic: Explaining Black Identification with the Democratic Party

“…A number of scholars have estimated the determinants of party identification as well as assessing its effects on issue positions, voting behavior, turnout, and presidential approval (Abramson and Ostrom, Jr. 1991;Miller and Shanks 1996). Some analyses have even examined the stability of party identification in the aggregate and the best ways to measure it (Abramson and Ostrom, Jr. 1991;Miller and Shanks 1996). All these studies have been concerned with the party identification of whites; the party identification of blacks was an afterthought.…”