Complexity and Social Networks Blog

« Mobile Phone Service Providers and Customer Location Information | Main | Open-Source Spying »

4 December 2006

Geography, demography, the emerging Republican majority (?), and social networks

A post script on the election: Over the last couple of decades there has been a lot written on the emerging “Republican majority.” The 2006 election, providing majorities to Democrats in both houses in Congress, seemingly belies this assertion. However, it is only one election, with results in part a referendum on an unpopular President, and in part a referendum on a poorly run Republican Congress. Neither changes the basic tectonics of American politics, so it is worth revisiting the Republican majority thesis.

In part, these assertions rest on geography (red states are generally growing in population faster than blue states), and in part on demography (red voters growing faster as share of electorate than blue voters).

The argument about geography rests on the fast growth rates of the (red) South and West, and the slow growth rates of (blue) Northeast. These divergent growth rates have to be driven by some combination of migration and divergent fertility/mortality. (These growth rates over the short run have to be primarily the former, although for interesting piece on the fertility component, which argues that conservatives have more children and thus will inherit the body politic. I think the argument in the final paragraph, however, trumps this fertility analysis). To the extent that the growth rates are driven by intra-US migration, the question is what happens when blue staters move into a red state. There are two possibilities: (1) the blue staters are socialized into the ways of their adopted state; or (2) the politics of their adopted state shifts incrementally toward a shade of purple.

I have not seen a definitive study of this issue (please post a comment if you have); however, the election of Webb (and Kaine in 2005) in Virginia offers an intriguing hint. Northern Virginia, in the orbit of Washington DC, is home to many transplanted blue staters, and is a nice laboratory to examine the social persuasion effects of a red state on these blue staters. The electoral results in 2005 and 2006, where Northern Virginia provided Webb and Kaine their margins of victory, suggests that the migrants to red states, rather than taking on reddish hues, may be coloring their adopted states blue.

Of course, Northern Virginia has some particular characteristics—e.g., many of its residents work in Washington DC, and thus may be predisposed to be more pro-government. Further, migrants to Virginia have clustered in Northern Virginia, rather than scattering randomly through Virginia, perhaps allowing them to escape the social pressures to conform. However, such clustering is typical; further, it is interesting to see that the Rocky Mountain West, long the bedrock of the Republican party, has become more competitive. This might well be in part because of migrants (some combination of Mexican immigrants, ex Californians, and East Coasters) have pulled these states left. It is also probably because libertarian, Goldwater, types are somewhat disenchanted with current big government Republicanism. (Note, New Hampshire, the state with the single biggest Republican to Democratic shift in 2006, also falls into this category, with substantial numbers of migrants from Massachusetts, but also with those libertarian tendencies.)

Stepping away from social networks for a moment, it does seem like the Bush years will prove a lasting liability for the Republican party. Party affiliation “sets” in early adulthood. The perceived success or failure of the sitting President thus gets recorded in the party affiliation of those individuals, with electoral effects for the next 50 years. Much as the Reagan-Bush I years produced a generation of Republican-tilting voters (or at least, neutrally balanced voters), the Clinton-Bush years may be producing a generation of Democratic-tilting voters. (my single favorite political graphic of this election season). I suspect that this graphic, if anything, understates the generational tilt toward Democrats, inasmuch as many of the earlier generation of Democrats are Southern white Democrats who tend vote nationally like Republicans. This demographic tilt toward the Democrats is also pushed further by the apparent drop in the Republican share of the Hispanic vote from 2004 to 2006. We will see if this is just temporary; however, conventional wisdom (correctly, I think) is that share of the Hispanic vote is critical in future elections because of its increasing size.

The bottom line, however, is that it is becoming increasingly difficult to assert that the axis of American politics is shifting toward Republicans. The election of 2006 is just another bit of evidence, among many.

Posted by David Lazer at December 4, 2006 9:00 AM

.
• Business (3)
.
• Citizen Relationship Management (17)
.
• Commentary (7)
.
• Complexity (2)
.
• Current Trends (47)
.
• eGovernment (21)
.
• Events/Announcements (72)
.
• Innovation (14)
.
• Internet (18)
.
• Knowledge Sharing (20)
.
• Methodology (32)
.
• Networked Governance (18)
.
• Networks in political science (5)
.
• PNG Working Paper Series (6)
.
• Powerlaws (4)
.
• Reviews (2)
.
• Simulations (1)
.
• Small group networks (3)
.
• Small Worlds (2)
.
• SN in the news (72)
.
• Social Capital (3)
.
• Social Computing (12)
.
• Social Finance (1)
.
• Social Networking Platforms (11)
.
• Social Psychology (2)
.
• Social Software (25)
.
• Societal Networks (40)
.
• Technology (35)