Welcoming Their Hatred: Class Populism in Democratic Rhetoric in American Presidential Campaigns, 1932–2012

Abstract

Conventional wisdom holds that Democrats have abandoned the language of class populism. Using a quantitative and qualitative content analysis of hundreds of Democratic presidential campaign speeches over the 1932-2012 period, we revisit the received view. We provide evidence that Democratic presidential candidates have made increasingly frequent references to the wealthy; have employed a consistently adversarial tone in statements referring to the affluent; have made increasingly frequent criticisms of Republicans' alleged favoritism toward the rich; and have increasingly linked references to the wealthy to promises to assist less fortunate Americans through programmatic reforms. Our findings indicate that class populism is alive and well in Democratic presidential campaign rhetoric.

Does Class-Based Campaigning Work? How Working Class Appeals Attract and Polarize Voters

“…We believe there are a few potential explanations for these asymmetric reactions that future work could address. First, the working class has historically had a special role in politics in many countries as seen in the frequent invocation of this group in party and candidate appeals (Evans & Tilley, 2017;Lipset & Rokkan, 1967;Przeworski & Sprague, 1986;Rhodes & Johnson, 2017). It may be that upper middle class individuals simply see appeals to the working class as part of the background of politics even if they discount their actual relevance due to the upper-class favoritism in policymaking (O'Grady, 2019;Schlozman et al, 2017).…”

“…Politicians frequently appeal to social groups. Recent studies on political rhetoric in the US, Britain, and the Scandinavian countries report that party manifestos, political speeches, and campaign advertisements are, to a substantial degree, dedicated to group appeals (Elder & Phillips, 2017; Evans & Tilley, 2017; Horn et al, 2020; Nteta & Schaffner, 2013; Rhodes & Johnson, 2017; Thau, 2018). Our primary concern is with the effect of symbolic group appeals on subsequent voter preferences.…”

“…These examples are not particularly rare. In fact, class rhetoric is still quite common among left-wing political elites in the US, Britain, and Scandinavia (Horn et al, 2020; Rhodes & Johnson, 2017; Thau, 2019). Working class appeals also figure prominently in debates concerning the success of right-wing populist politicians such as Marine Le Pen in France, Luigi Di Maio in Italy, and Donald Trump in the US (Lamont et al, 2017; Mutz, 2018; Rydgren, 2013).…”

The Historical Presidency: Fear and Loathing in Presidential Candidate Rhetoric, 1952–2016

“…We used both quantitative and qualitative methods to assess trends in emotional content relating to fear and anger in presidential candidate statements about their opponents. For our quantitative content analysis, we used a dictionary-based method, which involves counting the frequency of keywords associated with particular overarching concepts or themes (Stone et al 1962;Hart 1984;Lim 2008;Young and Soroka 2012;Azari 2014;Rhodes, Albert, and Johnson 2017). We applied three keyword dictionaries: a dictionary of Negative words, a dictionary of Fear words, and a dictionary of Anger words.…”

“…For example, Clinton claimed melodramatically, "George Bush's legacy is the destruction of [the] middle class." At the same time, Clinton sought to stoke listeners' anger toward Bush by repeatedly presenting him as a president who catered to the economic interests of special-interest lobbyists and the wealthy while ignoring the needs of ordinary citizens (Rhodes et al 2017). As he bluntly put it in one address, "Mr. Bush stands for a government that springs into action whenever a special interest needs a bailout or a tax break.…”