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Course Summary:
Trends in PID, Ideology, &
Party Support
Spring 2010
Masaryk University
Department of Int’l Relations & European
Studies
Dave McCuan
American National Election Studies
• ANES studies have been held in conjunction with every
Presidential election since 1952 (and most off-year)
Congressional elections.
• A large portion of POLS (Political Science) knowledge
concerning U.S. electoral behavior is derived from this
series of studies.
• Each ANES is a survey of approximately two thousand
randomly selected respondents who collectively
constitute a representative sample of the American
voting-age population at the time.
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Party Identification and Ideology
• Party affiliation and identification (PID):
– Generally speaking, do you think of yourself as a Republican, a
Democrat, an Independent, or what? [If partisan] Would you call
yourself a strong Republican/Democrat or a not very strong
Republican/Democrat? [If Independent] Do you think of yourself
as closer to the Democratic Party or the Republican Party?
– About 95% of the mass public identify themselves as
Democratic, Republican, or Independent.
• Ideology:
– We hear a lot of talk these days about liberals and
conservatives. Where would you place yourself in these terms,
or haven’t you thought much about this?
– About 25% of the mass public “haven’t thought much about this.”
Party Identification: 1952-2004
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Ideology: 1972 - 2004
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Party ID and Ideology
• Note the anomaly:
– More Democrats than Republicans, but
– More conservatives than liberals.
Ideology at the Mass Level
• Abortion and Health Insurance opinions are
largely unrelated.
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Ideology at the Mass Level
Economic/New Deal Issues
vs.
Social/Cultural/”Family Values” Issues
At the Elite Level, Party ID and Ideology Are Now
Almost Perfectly Correlated
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Presidential
Approval
• “Do you
approve or
disapprove
of the way
George W.
Bush is
handling
his job as
President?”
Party Identification “Colors” Presidential
Approval (and other opinions)
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Democratic Vote By Party ID
Do You Recall This Map?
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2004 Electoral Map (Red Blue)
The 2004 Battleground (± 3%)
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2000 Electoral Map
2000 Battlegrounds
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2004 By 2000
This Map Is From Which Election?
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Median Household Income – Why
is this Critical?
2000 Presidential Vote By County
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What Is Going On With US Voters?
• “Wal-Mart [or Sam’s Club] Republicans”?
• “Trust Fund Democrats”?
• What’s The Matter With Kansas? How
Conservatives Won the Heart of America?
(Thomas Frank)
• Are we that far beyond the New Deal
electoral alignment?
• Actually – No…with some caveats.
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• Uses 2000 and 2004
National and State
Exit Polls
– Plus ANES
• Andrew Gelman et
al., “Rich State, Poor
State, Red State,
Blue State: What’s
the Matter with
Connecticut,”
Quarterly Journal of
Political Science
(March 2007)
• The following charts
are all from the 2000
National and State
Exit Polls.
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2004: If Only Rich Voted
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2004: If Only Middle $ Voted
2004: If Only Poor Voted
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Religion and Class Voting
Around the World
Religion and Class Voting
Around the World (cont'd.)
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1960 vs. 2000: Red Gets Redder and Blue Gets Bluer
Mean Winner’s Margin in Victory at State Level
Unweighted Weighted by State’s Electoral Vote
1960 2000 1960 2000
8.5 14.6 6.5 12.6
1960 2000
CA Nixon 0.5 Gore 11.7
FL Nixon 3.0 Bush 0.0
IL Kennedy 0.2 Gore 12.0
MI Kennedy 3.1 Gore 5.2
NJ Kennedy 0.8 Gore 15.8
NY Kennedy 5.2 Gore 25.0
OH Nixon 6.6 Bush 3.6
PA Kennedy 2.4 Gore 4.2
TX Kennedy 2.0 Bush 21.7
Mean 2.6 11.0
1960 vs. 2000 (cont'd.)
Many of the most lopsided states in 1960 were even more lopsided in
2000.
KS Nixon 21.4 Bush 20.8
MA Kennedy 20.6 Gore 27.3
NE Nixon 24.2 Bush 20.8
RI Kennedy 27.2 Gore 29.1
UT Nixon 9.6 Bush 40.5
WY Nixon 10.0 Bush 40.1
Mean 18.3 30.0
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1960 vs. 2000 (cont'd.)
Here is a more comprehensive overview.
Kennedy vote in 1960 vs. Gore vote in 2000
Unweighted Weighted by State’s Electoral Vote
1960 2000 1960 2000
Min 37.9 28.3 37.9 28.3
Max 63.8 65.7 63.8 65.7
Mean 49.2 47.4 50.2 49.8
SD 5.7 9.1 5.0 8.0
All percentages are based on the two-party vote only, and DC [which did not
vote in 1960] and MS [where a slate of unpledged electors won in 1960] are
excluded from the statistics.
1960 vs. 2000 (cont'd.)
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1960 vs. 2000 (cont'd.)
Battleground State = in a 50-50% Election,
State Winner Would Get less than 53%
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The Shrinking Battlegrounds
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The Bradley/Wilder and Whitman Effects?
The Front-Runner Effect in 2008?