Macropartisanship in California

Abstract

Political scientists have devoted considerable, well-justified attention to changes in macropartisanship at the national level but have generally ignored movement in aggregate party identification at the American state level. The case of California is especially interesting for a number of reasons, most notably because of the potential impact of rapid ethnic change on aggregate political attitudes. In this article we assess macropartisanship in the Golden State from 1980 through 2001, drawing on Field Polls of California adults. We find that essentially there have been two eras in recent state history: a period of increasing Republican identification up to 1991 and an era of increasing Democratic identification thereafter. Some of this apparent movement to the Democrats among Californians as a whole is attributable to the increasing Latino share of the Field Poll samples and the decision to offer the survey in Spanish. However, there has also been movement toward the Democratic Party within ethnic and racial subgroups. This movement can be found to some degree in all major groups (except for African Americans, who were already overwhelmingly identified with the Democratic Party), but it has been especially pronounced among Latinos and Asian Americans. We consider possible reasons and discuss potential implications.