State Policy Network (SPN) released a new study on polarization and the American electorate that finds American voters share many common values that transcend party lines.
Authors Erin Norman, SPN’s Lee Family Fellow and Senior Director of Communications Strategies, and Lura Forcum, SPN’s Director of Marketing Communications, wanted to understand how the political realignment will impact policy reform efforts around the country since it’s clear that neither party reliably represents the positions they held in the past.
As noted above, rather than two political parties made up of voters with strongly opposing values, Americans share much common ground across party lines, and they cluster into far more than the two groups.
American politics is more tribal—people go with the party that feels closer to their identity—but when voters are mapped by how they perceive their access to resources, feelings of community, and what constitutes morality, the resulting groups don’t align strongly with one party or the other (except for one of the seven segments identified in the study).
Study author Erin Norman noted: “There is more uniting voters than politics divides them. Even where voters differ in how they look at the world and what is important to them, those values don’t place them into opposing parties.”
Forcum added: “We conducted this research to help the Network talk to people more effectively about policy, because we believe that shifting the national conversation to how policy can meet voters’ needs will yield more policy wins and help to cool the political discourse.”
Read the full study and executive summary here.
For more information or to schedule an interview, please reach out to Lura Forcum at lforcum@spn.org.
Beyond Polarization: How Americans Can Talk About Politics Again
Erin Norman and Lura Forcum at RealClearPolitics | July 19, 2024
Are We Less Polarized Than We Think?
National Review | July 22, 2024
