Asymmetry in the Political System: Occasional Activists in the Republican and Democratic Parties, 1956–1964

David Nexon

American Political Science Review, 1971, vol. 65, issue 3, 716-730

Abstract: By means of the Survey Research Center's national public opinion polls of the electorate during the 1956, 1960, and 1964 elections, the opinions of volunteer activists in the Republican and Democratic Parties were compared to those of rank and file members. On issues that divided rank and file Republicans from rank and file Democrats, Republican activists were found to be far more conservative than ordinary Republicans. Democratic activists, however, had about the same distribution of opinion as rank and file members of their party. Moreover, Republicans were proportionately far more active than Democrats. It was inferred from these findings that the two parties were different kinds of organizations. The Republican Party, it was argued, was a high participation party with an amateur base composed of right wing ideologues, while the Democratic Party was a low participation party with a professionalized base not dependent on ideological incentives to activism.

Date: 1971
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