Open versus closed primaries and the ideological composition of presidential primary electorates

Norrander, Barbara; Wendland, Jay

doi:10.1016/j.electstud.2016.03.003

Cited by 20 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 15 publications

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“…In particular, liberals are now much more likely to participate in Democratic primaries and conservatives are more likely to participate in Republican primaries rather than attending the primary of the other party. This is consistent with recent research showing that primaries with more open rules of participation do not have more moderate primary electorates (Hill, 2015;Norrander and Wendland, 2016;Sides et al, 2014). Instead, party sorting shapes the parties, and changes in primary electorates reflect changes in the composition of the parties regardless of what institutional barriers to participation are relaxed or put in place.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Southern realignment, party sorting, and the polarization of American primary electorates, 1958–2012

Hill

Tausanovitch

2017

Public Choice

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Many scholars have argued that primary elections are an important factor in the polarization of the American Congress. Yet little research measures change in the policy preferences of primary electorates to evaluate the connection directly. We create the first explicit measures of the preferences of primary voters over the last 60 years using a Bayesian item-response theory model. Although the overall distribution of population preferences has changed little, the preferences of primary voters are now much more related to the party of the primary that they attend. We show that liberals are much more likely to turn out in Democratic primaries and conservatives are much more likely to turn out in Republican primaries. We estimate that the divergence of primary from general electorates is six times larger in 2012 than in 1958 owing to this "primary sorting". This trend began with the emergence of the Southern Republicans. As the Republican party became viable, conservative Southerners switched to Republican primaries leading to a leftward shift in Democratic primary electorates. Nationwide, primary sorting began sometime after it began in the South. We speculate that Southern Realignment played a clarifying role that contributed to subsequent sorting of primary electorates nationwide.

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Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Southern realignment, party sorting, and the polarization of American primary electorates, 1958–2012

Hill

Tausanovitch

2017

Public Choice

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“…Both candidates fit the common image of candidates benefiting from caucuses where participants tend to be positioned on the outer edges of the ideological spectrum and to be firmly dedicated to particular candidates (Karpowitz & Pope, 2015;Norrander, 1993;Panagopoulos, 2010). Consistent with Southwell's (1991) and Norrander and Wendland's (2016) findings, a state's decision to restrict participation to party identifiers or to open its delegate-selection event had no bearing on candidates' vote shares.…”

Section: Effects Of Rules On Candidate Vote Sharesmentioning

confidence: 59%

“…Usher (2000) demonstrates that the proportion of state delegations to Republican conventions that were socially conservative increased in 1992 and 1996 in states where rules allowed grassroots involvement, that is, in open caucuses. However, Southwell (1991) and Norrander and Wendland (2016) find little difference in candidates' vote shares or ideological composition of the electorate between presidential primaries open to both party identifiers and independents and those restricted to party identifiers.…”

Section: Party Rules For Delegate Selectionmentioning

confidence: 88%

Party Rules and Equitable Representation in U.S. Presidential Nominating Contests

King

2018

American Politics Research

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Party rules for determining allocation of delegates to the Democratic and Republican national conventions once again drew criticism in 2016. Analyses of the effects of various rules indicate that the inclusion of party leader and elected official delegates (“superdelegates”) within the Democratic Party and use of winner-take-all primary elections by Republicans bias the representativeness of states’ delegations to national conventions; neither the choice of primary election or caucuses nor of open or closed events affect representativeness. The choice of primary election or caucuses did affect vote percentages of candidates, but the choice of open or closed events had no effect on candidates’ vote percentages in recent nominating contests. The basic conclusion is that the party rules that created biased, unrepresentative state delegations to national conventions and that benefited certain candidates in the 1980s continue to do so in the 21st century.

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“…Much of this is speculative and theoretical, as none of these changes have been fully implemented. Importantly, some political scientists are skeptical about their ability to reduce polarization [186][187][188], so we note them here as food for thought, rather than making definitive claims about the effects of these proposals.…”

Section: More Investigation Neededmentioning

confidence: 99%

Interventions to reduce partisan animosity

et al. 2022

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Rising partisan animosity is linked to less support for democracy and more support for political violence. Here we provide a multi-level review of interventions designed to improve partisan animosity, which we define as negative thoughts, feelings, and behaviors towards a political outgroup. We introduce the TRI framework for the three levels of interventions-Thoughts (correcting misconceptions, highlighting commonalities), Relationships (building dialogue skills, fostering positive contact), and Institutions (changing public discourse, transforming political structures)-and connect these levels by highlighting the importance of motivation and mobilization. Our review encompasses both interventions conducted as part of academic research projects, as well as real-world interventions led by practitioners in nonprofit organizations. We also explore the challenges of durability and scalability, examine self-fulfilling polarization and interventions that backfire, and discuss future directions for reducing partisan animosity.

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Open versus closed primaries and the ideological composition of presidential primary electorates

Cited by 20 publications

References 15 publications

Southern realignment, party sorting, and the polarization of American primary electorates, 1958–2012

Southern realignment, party sorting, and the polarization of American primary electorates, 1958–2012

Party Rules and Equitable Representation in U.S. Presidential Nominating Contests

Interventions to reduce partisan animosity

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