Red Fighting Blue
How Geography and Electoral Rules Polarize American Politics

Democrats and Republicans have become geographically divided along regional lines, which has furthered the ideological polarization of American politics.

David A. Hopkins (Author)

9781107191617, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 25 September 2017

256 pages, 42 b/w illus.
24.2 x 16.3 x 2 cm, 0.47 kg

'Red Fighting Blue is a valuable addition to the literature on American party politics and voting behaviour. Anyone interested in understanding American politics in the Twenty-first century will find David Hopkins' analysis of the geographic underpinnings of our polarized politics to be extremely helpful.' Alan I. Abramowitz, Congress and the Presidency

The national electoral map has split into warring regional bastions of Republican red and Democratic blue, producing a deep and enduring partisan divide in American politics. In Red Fighting Blue, David A. Hopkins places the current partisan and electoral era in historical context, explains how the increased salience of social issues since the 1980s has redefined the parties' geographic bases of support, and reveals the critical role that American political institutions play in intermediating between the behavior of citizens and the outcome of public policy-making. The widening geographic gap in voters' partisan preferences, as magnified further by winner-take-all electoral rules, has rendered most of the nation safe territory for either Democratic or Republican candidates in both presidential and congressional elections - with significant consequences for party competition, candidate strategy, and the operation of government.

1. A nation votes, Ohio decides
2. Solid states: the regional bases of the American parties
3. The geographic roots of party strength and cohesion
4. Mapping the cultural battlefield: how social issues fuel the regional divide
5. Regional polarization and partisan change in the US congress
6. Rural red, big-city blue, and the pivotal purple midwest
7. A locked-up nation.

Subject Areas: Political parties [JPL], Constitution: government & the state [JPHC]