Asymmetric Politics 11
Asymmetric Politics:
The Republican Ideological Movement and the Democratic Group Coalition
Matt Grossmann
Michigan State University
David A. Hopkins
Boston College
Description
Scholars often portray American political conflict as a fight between two equivalent sides on the left and right of the ideological spectrum. Political science builds generic theories of public opinion, political organizations, election campaigns, and policymaking that are intended to apply equally well to Democrats and Republicans. We argue that the two parties and their supportive constituencies are not configured similarly and do not respond comparably to the same circumstances. The Republican Party is best seen as the agent of an ideological movement, whereas the Democratic Party is better understood as a coalition of social groups. Democratic subgroups seek concrete government action from their allies in office but right-of-center activists instead prize doctrinal commitment. Building on this core distinction, our proposed book investigates the most consequential differences in the organization and style of the two sides of American politics. Whether examining voters, activists, candidates, or officeholders, we find that Democrats and Republicans think differently about politics, producing distinct practices and structures rather than converging on an ideal form of political activism.
The contemporary Republican Party is an agent of an ideological movement whose members are united by a devotion to the principles of small government and traditionalism. As a result, conservatives (1) harbor an innate skepticism about the use of government action to address policy issues or social problems, (2) tend to evaluate public policy on the basis of ideological congeniality more than intended or empirical results, and (3) face an ongoing internal tension between doctrinal purity and the inevitable failures and compromises inherent in governing—a tension that is exacerbated by the presence of both a powerful cadre of movement leaders who are devoted to policing ideological orthodoxy within the Republican Party and a set of business interests that favor some accommodation. Republican politicians successfully appeal to voters outside their loyal electoral base by emphasizing broad themes of individual liberty and limited government that are enduringly popular in the American mass public. The conservative movement has also built an influential media apparatus designed to enforce consensus on policy issues and current events, providing conservative figures an alternative venue to mainstream outlets perceived as hostile to conservative viewpoints.
The Democratic Party, in contrast, is less an ideologically unified movement than a looser coalition of social groups whose interests are served by government action of one form or another. Because the elements of their base tend to have specific programmatic demands, Democrats are more likely than Republicans to take close interest in both the details of legislating and the empirical evaluation of policy outcomes, and less likely to be satisfied with inaction or symbolic acts of ideological expression. Each set of Democratic constituents focuses their attention on their own specific policies of interest. Democratic leaders face a greater challenge than conservatives in maintaining internal philosophical unity and meeting the multiple substantive goals of coalition members. No powerful self-defined liberal movement or media apparatus exists to impose ideological orthodoxy on elected officials across a range of issues. On the campaign trail, Democrats benefit from the relative operational liberalism of the American electorate, selling themselves as proponents and defenders of specific initiatives that advance an interest of their base but also provide tangible benefits to a broader population of voters.
Our book focuses on the implications of political competition between an ideological movement on the right and a social group coalition on the left. The Democratic Party’s policy agenda is a summation of the objectives of its discrete constituent groups; for Republicans, the party platform is often a reflection of broader conservative doctrine. Democrats need government to act more often and more comprehensively to achieve their diverse group goals; Republicans often value inaction. This produces a dissimilar population of party activists, interest groups, and policy entrepreneurs on each side with distinct priorities, strategies, and habits. The partisan asymmetry unifies and structures the book’s findings in five different contexts: public opinion, political organizations, policy information, election campaigns, and policymaking.
The book’s results challenge established theories, introducing a new view of the two-sided American political debate. We subject spatial models of political competition in each context to scrutiny, finding that they too often assume symmetry between the parties. We point to several mischaracterizations of American public opinion, party politics, and the policy process that fail to attend to political asymmetry. We argue that many allegedly deductive theories were actually inducted based on the experience of the dominant party, usually the Democrats. Much of what we think we know about American politics, it turns out, does not apply well to contemporary Republican governance, which explains why the behavior of the current Tea Party-influenced GOP often appears to baffle political observers.
The asymmetry that we document was recognized by previous generations of party scholars, but we are the first to empirically assess and substantiate claims of fundamental differences. In contrast to prior claims of party asymmetry, we find that the differences are not limited to party organizations and do not necessarily distinguish “unified” Republicans from “disorganized” Democrats; we can therefore better account for the current Tea Party-fueled dissension within the Republican Party than previous accounts that portrayed Republicans as naturally orderly and deferential to their leadership. In our view, the parties differ in the sources of their internal unity and the dimensions of intra-party conflict, not in their consistent effectiveness. Compared to contemporary findings of asymmetric polarization at the elite level, our argument concentrates on the longstanding differences in the electoral and activist bases of the two parties. We explain why the Tea Party found much more fertile ground in the Republican base and why no similar ideological movement succeeded among the Democrats.
The proposed book relies on varied data and analyses. We draw upon public opinion surveys, campaign finance records, lobbying disclosures, and interviews and surveys of activists and officials. We conduct or report content analyses of media coverage, candidate statements, research reports, archives, and group websites and use network analysis of ties within each political coalition. Although each chapter contains original data, we are careful not to re-invent the wheel; where other authors have already conducted relevant data collection and analysis, we report and build on their accounts. Each chapter demonstrates that a key difference is enduring and includes paired cases illustrating the distinct responses of Democrats and Republicans to similar circumstances.
Nonetheless, we articulate clear boundaries for our analysis. We do not imply that liberal or conservative views on political practice stem from genetic- or personality-based differences, only that they manifest widely and regularly. We find links between the contemporary policy agendas of each party and their organizational and strategic differences, but we do not claim that the same differences have characterized the two parties throughout American history or that they apply equally well to all conservative or liberal factions worldwide. The differences we find characterize the sides of political debate in the contemporary United States; they have all been apparent for multiple decades but many have even earlier foundations. We specify the historical roots and potential contingencies associated with each of the distinctions that we identify between Democrats and Republicans at both the mass and elite levels.
The book should appeal to wide audiences. The argument is so foundational, even elementary, to American politics that it should inspire interest among political practitioners and laypersons as well as scholars. Although the divergence in practices between left and right is a basic fact of political life in America, no one has yet collected and analyzed the major differences and their implications. We substantiate our claim that American politics is fought on an uneven, asymmetric terrain with detailed studies, synthesizing vast previous research findings to enable a global view of left-right distinctions and their impact on political competition.
Table of Contents
Introduction: Not Mirror Images
We argue that many theories of American political institutions and behavior share a fundamental flaw: they assume that the left and right are organized symmetrically and will therefore behave similarly when faced with the same circumstances or strategic environment. We describe the enduring differences between Democrats and Republicans with respect to the nature of their electoral coalitions, campaign themes, group demands, and goals in office that collectively challenge the accuracy of this assumption, and present their implications for American politics. We argue that an acknowledgment of partisan asymmetry is critical for understanding how politics and government evolve and why politicians and activists on each side misunderstand one another. Partisan asymmetry also specifically explains the rise and persistence of the Tea Party and its role in Republican governance. We agree with recent claims that the Republican Party’s distinct behavior is most responsible for Washington gridlock and legislative dysfunction, but note that the leadership is following the consistent desires of its conservative electoral and activist base. We outline the book’s argument and its evidence and provide a roadmap for the chapters ahead.
Chapter 1: How Democrats and Republicans Think About Politics
We argue that a majority of the American public simultaneously endorses liberal positions on most specific policy issues while favoring conservative views on more general questions concerning the proper role and size of government, drawing on the data and analysis from Ideology in America by Christopher Ellis and James Stimson. Elected Republicans and conservative activists emphasize and shape the public’s general endorsement of conservative values while Democrats and liberals are encouraged by, and help to promote, the public’s relatively left-leaning attitudes on specific policy issues. Our analysis of open-ended responses regarding the parties and presidential candidates on the National Election Studies shows that Democrats cite more social group benefits in their views and Republicans make more ideological references in their views. Democratic and Republican activists also assess government and politicians differently: liberals expect repeated action on a set of issue priorities while conservatives expect a shift in the ideological direction of public policy. Because the public agrees with each side on its own terms, liberals and conservatives can each claim to represent the views of an electoral majority. Yet only the Republican base consistently prefers that its politicians avoid compromise in favor of principle and continue to move rightward rather than moderate, no matter whether their party is in or out of power in government.
Chapter 2: An Ideological Movement vs. a Social Group Coalition
We argue that the Democratic Party and its affiliated interest groups value representation of social group identities and interests whereas the Republican Party and conservative movement groups prize ideological orthodoxy. We use prior surveys of party activists and political convention delegates to substantiate our claim that the Democratic Party is comprised of a coalition of interest groups with separate concerns whereas the Republican Party is the home of an ideological battle that conservatives have won. Analyzing 30 years of political conventions, we also show that these preferences manifest in how they react to potential candidates, how they view and shape party rules and procedures, and when and why they sacrifice party unity. We find that Republican and Democratic operatives repeatedly chose opposite paths in similar contexts. Both parties are pulled toward the preferences of their respective activists, but toward different political approaches and priorities. Using lobbying disclosure and campaign finance data, we show corporations and ideological groups on one side and single-issue public interest groups and identity interests on the other. But only the Democrats have closely linked interest group coalitions that endorse the same candidates in elections and then endorse the same legislation in Congress. Republican leaders respond to regular popular rebellion from grassroots conservative groups, despite their financial reliance on business elites; they unite mainly in opposing new legislative initiatives.
Chapter 3: The Not-So-Great Debate
Conservatives and liberals each rely on their own set of media outlets and policy-relevant research, causing them to regularly talk past one another. Relying on prior public and activist surveys, we document media usage and preference patterns. Using content analyses of cable television news, talk radio, newspapers, and nightly newscasts, we show that conservative-oriented news relies more on ideological critiques and character allegations and less on policy controversies. The establishment of an explicitly conservative media ecosystem as a conscious alternative to “mainstream” journalistic outlets allows conservative media personalities to exert an influence over both Republican officeholders and conservative voters that has no true counterpart among Democrats. We also analyze books and op-eds by public intellectuals, finding that liberals more often cite empirical studies of social problems and policy evaluation whereas conservatives cite models of social behavior and canonical texts. Network analysis of citations shows two separated epistemic communities. We use prior surveys of academics and an original analysis of popular blogs to show that the patterns of research use stem from different views of the role of science and expertise, which are the product of distinct notions about government and policymaking. Studies of think tank documents and congressional testimony show that these approaches to research extend to Washington policy debates. They reinforce appeals to ideology on the right and comprehensive policy analysis on the left. We illustrate the distinct uses of research and media on the right through examples from Ronald Reagan’s radio addresses in the late 1970s and contemporary talk radio.
Chapter 4: Campaigning in Poetry and Prose
Conservatives use campaigns to draw from and shape ideological attitudes toward government whereas liberals use them to promise solutions to a series of social problems. Using prior content analyses of congressional candidate websites and candidate surveys, we argue that Democratic politicians make more specific policy proposals and that the most liberal candidates make the most detailed promises. Conservatives more often critique candidate character, make claims about their opponent’s ideology, and highlight biographical background. Re-analysis of prior studies of online discussions and newspaper opinion pages show that liberal and conservative activists request these foci from their candidates and criticize opposition candidates on the same grounds. We also analyze congressional and presidential primary elections, finding that Republican primaries are typically a battle over the mantle of conservatism whereas Democratic primaries are contests to amass social group coalitions via identity politics and policy position promises. We acknowledge that general election campaigns are the context in which both sides are most likely to seek to reach the same voters with similar messages, but show that they often still use appeals designed to strengthen their base and their existing advantages in public opinion. To illustrate, we closely examine the presidential campaigns of 1980, 1992, 2000, and 2008.