Realignment and Macropartisanship

Meffert, Michael F.; Norpoth, Helmut; Ruhil, Anirudh V. S.

doi:10.1017/s0003055400400122

Cited by 47 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…This possibility is consistent with the political cycles literature (e.g. Meffert, Norpoth and Ruhil 2001;Norpoth and Rusk 2007;Merril, Grofman and Brunell 2008).…”

Section: Competitive Equilibrium and Partisan Cyclessupporting

confidence: 91%

On Demographic Change and Competitive Equilibrium in American Politics

Zingher

2016

ARP

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In their seminal analysis of American elections, Stokes and Iversen (1962) demonstrated that each party’s share of the vote never strays very far from a competitive equilibrium. However, it is difficult to envision how this equilibrium will maintain amid changing demographics. The Republican leaning white proportion of the electorate is shrinking while the Democratic leaning Latino and Asian proportion is rapidly growing. These demographic changes threaten to tip the partisan balance in favor of the Democrats. Can the competitive equilibrium hold amid changing demographics? I answer this question in three steps. First, I analyze presidential election returns since the end of the Civil War. I confirm the presence of a competitive equilibrium. I then use a set of simulations to establish that demographic changes will tip the partisan balance in favor of the Democrats. I then assess how much the Republican Party will have to increase its level of support among whites and/or other groups to remain competitive. I find that relatively modest changes in white and/or Latino and Asian voting behavior will be sufficient to give the Republican Party an even chance of winning well into the future.

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“…This possibility is consistent with the political cycles literature (e.g. Meffert, Norpoth and Ruhil 2001;Norpoth and Rusk 2007;Merril, Grofman and Brunell 2008).…”

Section: Competitive Equilibrium and Partisan Cyclessupporting

confidence: 91%

On Demographic Change and Competitive Equilibrium in American Politics

Zingher

2016

ARP

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“…subsequent month. We employ a single decay (d) term for each relevant coefficient, following both our theoretical expectations and the standard practice of political science research (see, for example, Clarke et al, 1998;Wang, 1999;Meffert, Norpoth and Ruhl, 2001;Kelly, 2003;Wood and Doan, 2003). 9 The final conflict variable is onset of U.K. involvement in an international conflict during the month in question.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rally 'Round the Union Jack? Public Opinion and the Use of Force in the United Kingdom, 1948-2001

2005

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This paper provides the most comprehensive and extensive analysis to date of the possibility of a ''rally 'round the flag'' effectFan increase in support for the government caused by involvement in international conflictFin Britain, for the years 1948-2001. We use a fractionally integrated time series model with an array of political and economic controls. Our primary dependent variable is intention to vote for the ruling party. The results confirm earlier studies that the Falklands War generated a rally effect, but they provide a more sophisticated understanding of the Gulf War rally. New results also include the findings that participation in international crises which stopped short of war did not engender rallies, and that there were no rallies for the Korean, Suez, or Kosovo Wars. The findings indicate that when they do occur rallies are heterogeneous in nature, that rallies are most likely when there is intense and direct threat to the national interest, that the relationship between multilateralism and rallies in the British case is tenuous, and that rallies for the ruling party are sometimes expressed through satisfaction with the prime minister.Does involvement in international conflict affect a democratically elected government's popularity? Much of the empirical work on the so-called ''rally 'round the flag effect'' has to date been limited to exploration of the American case. In this paper, we test for the presence of rally effects in the United Kingdom. Past research has found that the Falklands War boosted Prime Minister (PM) Margaret Thatcher's popularity in the early 1980s, helping carry her to victory in the 1983 election. However, there are virtually no comprehensive studies exploring whether British conflict involvement has affected government popularity across a long time span, searching for the general effects of conflict on the popularity of British governments.This study aims to fill that gap. We ask the question: In the post-World War II period, has the popularity of the British government significantly increased when

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“…Increased public trust was linked mainly to Reagan's handling of inflation, which led Citrin and Green (1986) to conclude, "It seems that when it is believed that the most important problem facing the nation [inflation] has been handled successfully the public's regard for government can rise even if it is recognized that other serious problems [unemployment] remain" (p. 441). It also helped facilitate a partisan realignment toward the Republican Party, beginning in 1980, which obviously would have worked to the disadvantage of the Democrats (Meffert, Norpoth, & Ruhil, 2001). Party loyalties were realigned along ideological lines during the Reagan and post-Reagan eras (Abramowitz & Saunders, 1998).…”

Section: Variables and Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public Opinion and Democratic Party Ownership of Prosperity

Ponder

Simon

Wendell

et al. 2015

American Politics Research

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Recently, there has been renewed interest in the question of party ownership of economic prosperity, which Petrocik argued was a performance issue subject to the flow of events over which administrations have no control. Using Gallup Polls administered between 1955 and 2013, we investigate public opinion on whether Republicans or Democrats would do a better job of keeping the country prosperous. Using error correction analysis, we test political and economic variables to assess the political legacy of the Great Depression and New Deal. Our analysis shows that Democrats owned prosperity before the 1980s, but have since lost momentum in public opinion on the issue. New generations have no personal memories of the Great Depression or the ensuing partisan realignment. The Baby Boomer and so-called X generations, instead, experienced the stagflation of the 1970s during their young adulthood, frequently associated with the Carter Administration. A persistent legacy of the Great Depression, however, is

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Realignment and Macropartisanship

Cited by 47 publications

References 23 publications

On Demographic Change and Competitive Equilibrium in American Politics

On Demographic Change and Competitive Equilibrium in American Politics

Rally 'Round the Union Jack? Public Opinion and the Use of Force in the United Kingdom, 1948-2001

Public Opinion and Democratic Party Ownership of Prosperity

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