The Democracy Fund Voter Study Group has just released data on 2016 presidential election voters and their political stances from economic and social perspectives. This analyzes two categories of voter sentiments: economic and moral/identity issues. This presents a four-quadrant chart, divvying people up into populist, liberal, conservative, and libertarian political stances. The results of the chart for 2016 Trump voters was a spectrum on conservative moral/identity issues, but fairly centrist economic views.
Applying the
Downsian theory of parties formulating policies in order to win elections
rather than winning elections in order to formulate policies, Trump was able to transform his policies to appeal to historically populist
voters. Trump was able to rally people behind him by transforming the GOP to
appeal to its conservative voters who lean only center-right on economics. On
the other hand, the Democratic party has not been able to win elections despite
homogeneity among liberal voters because the party’s base is too far left to
convince persuadable voters. The GOP in 2016 was able to optimally cater to the
median voter while the Democratic party held strong among its base. As the
country shifts left, the Democratic party is out of touch with median voter,
hence it’s inability to win elections.
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