Tag: polarization

The dynamics of constituency representation on immigration policy in the U.S. house

Immigration policy used to be a bipartisan issue, but now it is one of the most divisive in American politics. This study explores how lawmakers’ behavior changed as immigration became a party-defining issue–and what that means for the way Congress represents the foreign-born population. Using immigration bills in the House of Representatives from 1983 to 2014, email newsletters from 2010 to 2020, and data on district characteristics the authors ask: Do representatives still respond to immigrant populations in their districts, or does representation depend on which party wins the seat?

Expectations

The authors set out to discover whether polarization on this issue changed the mechanism of representation. They expect that as the issue polarizes, immigrations positions will depend more on party than on the size of the foreign-born population in the district, and that the effect of the foreign born population will occur via the electoral mechanism – influencing which party holds the seat – rather than by lawmakers’ in the same party holding positions that align with district characteristics. They also expect that under polarization the constituency effect will shift to predicting how active lawmakers are on the issue, rather than their positions.

Methodology

To test their expectations, the authors use three sources to measure lawmakers’ positions on immigration: floor speeches, email newsletters, and an original data set of immigration-related bills. Then, using regression models, they estimate the relationship between district demographics and legislators’ positions.

Key Findings

The Partisan Divide Has Grown

Figure 1 reveals the dramatic divergence of immigration positions over time between the two political parties. While Republicans move sharply toward anti-immigration positions, Democrats grew more supportive of immigration. This finding suggests that immigration has become a core partisan issue in U.S. politics, leaving little room for bipartisan collaboration.

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Figure 1. OLS coefficients of republican partisanship on pro-immigration positions. Figures report coefficients on Republican partisanship from OLS models estimate for each dependent variable in each Congress. Y-axes are on different scales.

The Mechanism of Representation Has Changed

Figure 2 suggests that immigrant populations still matter–but indirectly. Instead of shaping individual lawmakers’ positions, foreign-born constituents hold more influence on which party wins the congressional seat itself, in part because they have become a more Democratic constituency. While Democrats representing districts with larger foreign-born populations. The correlation between the foreign-born population and legislators’ positions has actually become stronger, but it now passes through partisanship rather than dyadic responsiveness.

Image Description

Figure 2. OLS coefficient of foreign-born percentage (10-point increments) on immigration positions over time.

Asymmetrical Activism

Figure 3 shows that Democrats with higher shares of immigrant constituents tend to be more active on immigration (e.g., sponsoring bills, giving speeches, and mentioning immigration in emails). On the other hand, Republicans show no such trend. Instead, the most conservative Republicans are the most active on immigration. For Democrats, the immigration agenda is set by representatives of immigrant communities, while for Republicans it is set by the conservative wing.

Image Description

Figure 3. Effect of percentage foreign born on the number of actions by party.

Why It Matters

Polarization has transformed how representation works. This article explores how party sorting reshapes legislative behavior and agenda-setting on immigration. For immigrant communities, influence now depends on influencing which party wins the election. The authors insist that future research should explore whether similar patterns occur on other party-defining issues, and how local advocacy strategies adapt in an era of deep national divides.

Read the original article in Policy Studies Journal:

Cayton, Adam and Lena Siemers. 2025. “The Dynamics of Constituency Representation on Immigration Policy in the U.S. House.” Policy Studies Journal 53(2): 480–498. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12579.

About the Article’s Authors

Adam Cayton is an associate professor in the Reubin O’D. Askew Department of Government at the University of West Florida. His research focuses on legislative representation. He received a Ph.D. from The University of Colorado – Boulder, and a B.A. from The University of North Carolina at Asheville.

Lena Siemers is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell. Her research focuses on migrant and refugee studies. She received a M.A. from the University of West Florida and a B.A. from the University of South Alabama.

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Measuring the Stasis: Punctuated Equilibrium Theory and Partisan Polarization

by Clare Brock & Daniel Mallinson

Gridlock and partisan polarization are popularly blamed for every American social and political ill–from the inability of Congress to pass much needed policy reform on a variety of issues, to the inefficacy of bureaucracy, to the divisive rhetoric espoused in presidential debates. The headlines are not inaccurate in their assessment of the division and dysfunction that currently plagues American politics; however, they do not tell the entire story either.

Partisan polarization and gridlock are always high salience, high attention problems. But they do not operate the same way across all policy areas, nor is it appropriate to explain all outcomes (or lack thereof) in terms of these two phenomena. Total gridlock as a result of polarization, for example, is simply not an accurate way to describe American governance. Congress does pass important legislation, including, but not limited to, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, and the 2010 Affordable Care Act. In short, Congress can legislate. The question is then, when and on what issues can Congress act, and why does it seem so incapable of moving forward on so many other issues?

In “Measuring the stasis: Punctuated equilibrium theory and partisan polarization,” we use punctuated equilibrium theory (PET) to explore the role of partisan polarization in a stop-and-go policy process. PET predicts that the policy process is characterized by long periods of stability (gridlock), interspersed with brief periods of drastic change. In other words, the policy process is neither completely gridlocked, nor is it incremental; rather, policymaking tends to be alternatively highly stable and highly volatile. The degree of volatility is, in part, a function of how much friction is built into the governing system. Higher levels of friction will mean a more extreme pattern of punctuation – longer periods of stasis, but also, larger policy changes when sufficient pressure does build up to generate change.

We look at partisan polarization as a source of increasing friction in the political system, relying on annual data from federal budget authority and the passage of public laws from the Comparative Agendas Project to capture policy change, and NOMINATE scores that measure partisan polarization. These data stretch from 1948 to 2020 and allow us to evaluate how partisan polarization has affected budget-making and public law passage across multiple policy areas over the years.

Figure 1 shows the trends over time in partisan polarization (it is increasing) and budgetary and public law kurtosis. Kurtosis is a common way to measure the degree of policy punctuation. When it is high, there are long periods of incremental changes (i.e., stasis) that are punctuated by large policy changes. The higher the kurtosis, the more extreme the pattern of stasis and punctuation. As indicated by the trend lines, partisan polarization has been steadily rising since the 1960s, but underwent a considerable jump during the mid-1990s and again in the early-2000s. Likewise, while budget kurtosis was high in the 1950s and 60s, it dropped for the next two decades before a large and rapid increase between 1996 and 2012. Public law kurtosis remained steady until the 199s when it increased and then became more volatile. Notably, these dynamics settled back down after 2012.

Figure 1: Changes in U.S. National Government budget kurtosis and congressional polarization, 1957–2020.

Much like the increased budgetary kurtosis and declining passage of public laws illustrated in Figure 1, the same results were found when controlling for the presence of divided government (i.e., when one party controls the Presidency and the other controls at least one chamber of Congress). In other words, the observed effects were most likely caused by the increase in polarization and not by other political factors expected to cause gridlock. This suggests that polarization has contributed to a more volatile policy process, with prolonged periods of stasis and reactively large moments of change.

It is worth noting that there were differences in these effects depending on the policy area. For example, polarization seemed to increase volatility more in energy policy than in transportation policy. Future research could do more to investigate the nuances uncovered in our analysis, and we hope that scholars will continue examining how polarization impacts our society.

You can read the original article in Policy Studies Journal at

Brock, Clare and Mallinson, Daniel. 2023. “Measuring the Stasis: Punctuated Equilibrium Theory and Partisan Polarization.” Policy Studies Journal 00(0): 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12519.

About the Authors

Clare Brock is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Colorado State University. Her research interests include public policy process, interest groups and advocacy, food politics, and the impact of polarization on policymaking.


Daniel J. Mallinson is an Associate Professor of Public Policy and Administration at Penn State Harrisburg. His research interests include policy process theory (particularly policy diffusion and punctuated equilibrium theory), cannabis policy, energy policy, and the science of teaching and learning.

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