Why is the US Election so volatile and yet so stable?

This year’s Presidential campaign has seen a candidate convicted of a felony and held legally liable for sexual abuse. It has seen the most disastrous debate performance in living memory, leading a sitting President to step aside and endorse a new nominee. It has seen not one but two attempted assassinations. Despite all this turmoil, the polls have held steady, and the election will likely be a dead heat till the very end.

How can a Presidential race experience this unprecedented list of events with such little movement in the polls? How can it be so highly volatile and yet seemingly so stable? Answering these questions requires one to look beyond the events themselves and towards more structural changes in American politics.

Unlike in Europe where political parties often track social class, the social groups which make up the American parties were for a long time very similar. Both could find conservatives and liberals among their ranks as well as those from similar walks of life. This changed with the Civil Rights Acts of the 1960s. Formally suppressed demands for racial equality came to the surface of American society, sparking a political realignment.

White conservatives started to desert the Democrats, and successive Republican leaders began courting southern and evangelical voters. Building over time, this process has resulted in a Republican Party which is now largely conservative, white and Christian, and a Democratic Party which is much more liberal, non-white and secular. This joining of party with identity has many consequences, one of which is that it narrows the perspectives of each side.

People tend to understand politics against the background of their social identities and experiences, each offering a certain unique perspective. In the past, this often-involved Americans viewing politics through a variety of identities, not all of which were party political, and some of which were shared by those on the other side. Christian, conservative, and Republican identities once offered alternative perspectives on current events, and there were many Democrats who similarly held Christian and conservative points of view.

Today these diverse identities have aligned within a single party, merging them into a singular ‘mega-perspective’. The realignment of American politics has collapsed previously varied identities and perspectives into just two lenses, associated with two distinct political camps. Each camp is made up of very different experiences and ways of life, producing two parties who see and understand politics through increasingly divergent and homogenous perspectives.

These mega-perspectives have led the parties to focus on very different sets of problems and concerns, entrenching party lines. Neither Republican nor Democratic perspectives can see much value (rightly or wrongly) in what the other side is offering, and so voters tend to stick with their party election after election. Given the two sides are closely matched in terms of the electoral college, this entrenchment of mega-perspectives is also relatively balanced. The parties are stuck on a knife’s edge, where neither has a clear path to victory, but both face a shrinking number of convincible voters.

These two elements of entrenched but balanced mega-perspectives are a recipe for a highly conflictual politics where few who are actively engaged are willing to change their votes. This year’s presidential race can therefore continue to experience the kinds of events which would have defined previous elections, but the polls will likely remain as close as ever.

Author Link: https://research.manchester.ac.uk/en/persons/j.benson

Author Twitter: @jdbenson_

Open Access Research Link: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-political-science-review/article/democracy-and-the-epistemic-problems-of-political-polarization/A1B13D1D4845FE5A440CCD3F5895063F

Image Attribution: "Donald Trump supporters" by Gage Skidmore is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0