Does gerrymandering cause polarization?

Publication Year
2009

Type

Journal Article
Abstract
Both pundits and scholars have blamed increasing levels of partisan conflict and polarization in Congress on the effects of partisan gerrymandering. We assess whether there is a strong causal relationship between congressional districting and polarization. We find very little evidence for such a link. First, we show that congressional polarization is primarily a function of the differences in how Democrats and Republicans represent the same districts rather than a function of which districts each party represents or the distribution of constituency preferences. Second, we conduct simulations to gauge the level of polarization under various 'neutral' districting procedures. We find that the actual levels of polarization are not much higher than those produced by the simulations. We do find that gerrymandering has increased the Republican seat share in the House; however, this increase is not an important source of polarization. Reprinted by permission of Blackwell Publishers
Journal
American journal of political science
Volume
53
Issue
3
Pages
- 680
Date Published
Jul 2009
ISBN
0092-5853, 0092-5853