Political Partisanship as a Social Identity
Abstract
Partisanship remains a powerful influence on political behavior within developed and developing democracies, but there remains a lively debate on its nature, origins, and measurement. In this debate, political scientists draw on social identity theory to clarify the nature of partisanship and its political consequences in the United States and other developed and developing democracies. In particular, social identity theory has been used to develop an expressive model of partisanship, which stands in contrast to an instrumental model grounded in ideological and policy considerations. Included here are a discussion of the key motivational and cognitive components of social identity theory and an explanation of how the theory can be applied to the study of partisanship. The focus is on the measurement of partisanship, its social nature, its origins in convergent identities, and its ability to generate strong emotions and drive political engagement. Lastly, areas for future partisanship research are discussed. These areas include the study of negative partisan identities, coalitional identities in multiparty systems, and the political situations in which expressive and instrumental aspects of partisanship are most common.
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Partisanship becomes a source of social segregation, extends beyond policy preferences to influence emotions, acts expressively and non-instrumentally by influencing personal identity, and is a shortcut for building judgments and making decisions.
“In short, partisanship becomes a source of social segregation, extends beyond policy preferences to influence the field of emotions, acts in an expressive and non-instrumental way by influencing our personal identity and, finally, is a great shortcut for building judgments and making decisions (Huddy & Bankert, 2017;Goldenberg et al., 2023).”
From ¿Demasiado lejos? Cómo la polarización mal percibida alimenta la polarización afectiva en España (2025) · cites this paper as Huddy & Bankert, 2017
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- Authors
- Huddy, L., & Bankert, A.
- Affiliations
- Stony Brook University (US)
- Venue
- Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics
- Publisher
- Oxford University PressNew York, NY
- Published
- 2017-05-24
- OpenAlex
- W2733714502
- Cited by
- 235
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 12 · 2025: 22 · 2024: 47 · 2023: 65 · 2022: 28 · 2021: 26 · 2020: 10 · 2019: 21 · 2018: 4
- Type
- reference entry
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Electoral Systems and Political Participation
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Political Theory and Democracy
- Keywords
- partisanship, social identity theory, emotions in politics, political participation, multiparty system, political behavior
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