The Rise Of Party Polarization In James Q. Wilson's How Divided Are We?

Party polarization is the idea that a party’s individual stance on a given issue or person is more likely to be liberal or conservative. Typically the rise of political uniformity has been more noticeable among people who are the most politically active, but as of late, the vast majority of the American public is spilt down the middle. The broad gap between liberals and conservatives is growing rapidly through the years. Which brings on questions of why there is a cultural division? While it is agreed by most political scientists that the media, elected officials, and interest groups are polarized on given issues, in James Q. Wilson’s article How Divided Are We? he discusses the factors that contribute to the division not only to those major

Although, in recent years it is seen that consumers are less likely to subscribe to newspapers and/or watch the daily news. This is due to the fact that they are typically bias in their opinions, and are seen to lack the whole story when presented. Rise in polarization in the media is due to a new found competition between news networks, which was not present sixty years ago. Wilson says, “the news we get is not only more omnipresent, it is also more competitive and hence often more adversarial”. The media outlets are fighting for views, and are willing to do whatever it takes to get them. Which leads to them configuring the stories to what people want to here. Thus making their viewer ratings higher. It is known that certain news stations get more views depending on the political party. “Those who watch CNN are more likely to be Democrats than Republicans; the reverse is emphatically true of Fox”. The media has more outlets to reach their viewers to maximize the effectiveness of their biased

It is seen that as political awareness increases, cultural division increases. Since 1972, the gap between Democrats and Republicans has doubled in 2004. Although this mass polarization is only seen within a minority of voters that happen to be college-educated, Marc Hetherington of Vanderbilt says “people with the greatest ability to assimilate new information, those with more formal education, are most affected by elite polarization”. The growth in polarization is noticeable because throughout the years the need for higher education has grown; no longer is a high school diploma enough. The younger generations are striving for college diplomas, which leads to more political agitation. It has been seen that affluence is out weighted by postgraduate education. American society is in a cultural war within itself since polarization has seeped down into the public. There is believed to be political differences that cannot be solved and this makes it hard for elected officials to solve problems they were elected to solve. There is a constant stand still with issues in America due to the high amount of polarization in this