Party renewal in the USA

Students quite frequently write that American parties are loose groupings and largely free of coherent ideology. But this analysis ignores the steep rise in partisanship evident in the USA in recent decades.

Election contests are bitterly fought, platforms more divided, votes in Congress more visibly down party lines than ever. It is true that some Democrats or Republicans share a similar stance on the odd policy or two, e.g. rural or Southern Democrats may oppose tougher control. But there is much more that divides them than unites them.

Partisanship was shown in Technicolor this week by two events in Washington. First, President Obama’s stimulus package was passed in both houses of Congress without garnering any GOP support in the House. Second, and probably not unrelated, Obama’s nominee for the Commerce post, Republican Senator Judd Gregg, withdrew from the nomination process citing concerns about his ability to do his job, i.e. as a Republican within a Democrat administration.

Good background reading if you are studying American parties is here: Tom Baldwin in the Times and Andrew Sullivan in the Sunday Times.