Compromise in an Age of Party Polarization

Congressional debates are increasingly defined by gridlock and stalemate, with partisan showdowns that lead to government shutdowns. Compromise in Congress seems hard to reach, but do politicians deserve all the blame? Legislators who refuse to compromise might be doing just what their constituents want them to do. In Compromise in an Age of Party Polarization, Jennifer Wolak challenges this wisdom and demonstrates that Americans value compromise in politics. Citizens want more from elected officials than just ideological representation--they also care about the processes by which disagreements are settled. Using evidence from a variety of surveys and innovative experiments, she shows the persistence of people's support for compromise across a range of settings-even when it comes at the cost of partisan goals and policy objectives. While polarization levels are high in contemporary America, our partisan demands are checked by our principled views of how we believe politics should be practiced. By underscoring this basic yet mostly ignored fact, this book stands as an important first step toward trying to reduce the extreme polarization that plagues our politics.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements Chapter 1: The Challenges of Compromise Chapter 2: Public Support for Political Compromise Chapter 3: Compromise as a Democratic Value Chapter 4: The Bounds of Public Support for Compromise Chapter 5: Partisan Motives and Consideration of Compromise Chapter 6: Campaigns, Competition, and Support for Political Compromise Chapter 7: Policymaking, Procedural Justice, and Support for Compromise Chapter 8: Do People Want Members of Congress to Compromise? Chapter 9: Support for Compromise in Principle and in Practice Chapter 10: Conclusions References Index

About the Author :
Jennifer Wolak is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Colorado at Boulder. She studies political behavior in the United States, with a particular focus on political psychology, public opinion, state politics, and gender.

Review :
"A willingness to compromise might be THE topic for political scientists to understand in this era of extreme polarization. Jennifer Wolak has done an absolutely masterful job with this critical, but difficult, topic." -- Marc Hetherington, Raymond Dawson Distinguished Bicentennial Professor of Political Science, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill "In this first ever deep look at public attitudes toward compromise, Wolak shows that people hold a principled belief in compromise because they are socialized to believe in it as a democratic value. Drawing on existing data and an innovative series of surveys and experiments, Wolak fully examines how context increases or diminishes support for compromise. Partisanship, conflict, and political environments all play a role in people's response to compromise, often in unexpected ways. This excellent book is essential reading for anyone interested in one of the most basic of democratic processes, the need for compromise." -- Elizabeth Theiss-Morse, Willa Cather Professor of Political Science, University of Nebraska-Lincoln