Religious Conservatives, the Republican Party and Evolving Party Coalitions in the United States

Bibliographic Data

ID6316809
AuthorsJonathan Knuckey (0000-0003-3602-5309, corresponding author)
Year1999
Volume5
Issue4
Pages485-496
Publication date1999-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueParty Politics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1354-0688 • E-ISSN: 1460-3683
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1354068899005004004
OpenAlexW2098407166
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited15

The growing importance of religious conservatives within the Republican Party is one of the most interesting aspects of evolving party coalitions in the USA. However, their identification has proved to be difficult because of different operational definitions of religious conservatives. In this paper, an alternative operational definition is posited, identifying conservative Republicans for whom religion is an important part of their lives. The paper proceeds by using this definition to estimate the number of religious conservatives in the mass electorate, and their political distinctiveness compared to other Republicans. While the definition used in this paper is a broad one, it is demonstrated that in terms of voting behavior and issue preferences, a `religious' conservative Republican is qualitatively distinct from a `secular' conservative Republican

Communism · Democracy · Optimal distinctiveness theory · Party platform · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Politics of the United States · Realigning election · Socialism · Sociology · Split-ticket voting · Voting · Electoral Systems and Political Participation · Gender Politics and Representation · Law · Religion and Society Interactions · Social Psychology

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