Studying ideological polarization in the U.S. congress using relative distribution method

• 발행기관: 연세대학교 동서문제연구원
• 저자명: Jae Mook Lee
• 간행물 정보: 『동서연구』제25권 1호, 99~127쪽, 전체 29쪽
• 주제분류: 사회과학 > 지역학
• 파일형태: PDF
• 발행일자: 2013.03.20

영문 초록

This study examines the pattern of growing ideological polarization in the U.S. House of Representatives using relative distribution method, a nonparametric tool designed for distributional analysis. Adopting DW-NOMINATE scores as measures of members’ ideological orientation in the House, this study suggests that elected officials are ideologically more polarized in later eras in comparison with the 1960s and partisan conflict thus became more intensified in the Congresses of 1990s and 2000s. One of the strengths that this article maintains is this study decomposes ideological polarization into shape change and location shift different from the existing literature. By doing do, the findings indicate that while the great majority of congressmen shift their ideological positions toward one extreme compared to the previous congress, the opposite tail of the distribution also gains some density at the same time. Indeed, ideological polarization in terms of changes in distributional shape occurred simultaneously while the entire ideological distribution of the House members oscillated between the leftward and rightward shifts

목차

I. Introduction 1

II. Contemporary literature on the U. S. Congressional Polarization 3

III. Measuring ideological preferences of congressional members 7

IV. Relative distribution method as an alternatvie empirical strategy 8

V. Descriptive analyses of ideological polarization in the U.S. House of Representative 13

VI. Applying the relative distribution method to congressional ideological polarization 18

VII. Conclusion 26

References 28

키워드

U.S. Congress Ideological polarization Relative distribution method Distributional analysis DW-Nominate Nonparametric tool U Congress