It used to be that members of Congress could fight it out on the issues, but often still find ways to work together and legislate. No more. Compromise has become a dirty word and little gets done. The co-authors of a new book, “Why Washington Won't Work,” can tell you one reason why: Democrats and Republicans in the populace “simply do not like each other to an unprecedented degree.” That translates into distrust and an unwillingness to sacrifice their political preferences for larger goals, say Thomas Rudolph and Marc Hetherington, political science professors at the University of Illinois and Vanderbilt University, respectively. Rudolph spoke with University of Illinois News Bureau social sciences editor Craig Chamberlain about what they found and why it matters.
The current dysfunction in Washington, and the level of political vitriol, might seem like just the latest chapter in a story going back decades. So what’s different now?
More than ever, American citizens don’t like their political opponents. Republicans and Democrats have always had their policy differences. Today’s polarization is about more than just differences on the issues. It is about feelings. Americans now strongly dislike and distrust their political adversaries.
In the past, Republicans and Democrats didn’t differ much in terms of how much they trusted the federal government. Over the last decade or so, political trust has become polarized along partisan lines to an unprecedented degree. Republicans are now much less likely to say that they trust the government in Washington when a Democrat occupies the White House. Democrats express similar distrust for government when it is controlled by Republicans.
Such polarization of political trust along partisan lines in the electorate makes it difficult for members of Congress to reach policy consensus in Washington. The polarization of political trust is driven not by issue differences, but by greater antipathy for the other side.
Why does this polarization of trust make such a difference? Why is it so toxic for legislating in Congress?
Low and polarized levels of trust in government among voters make it very difficult to forge legislative compromises. Passing major legislation in Congress often requires both sides of the debate to give up something. More specifically, it typically requires people to sacrifice some of their ideological preferences or principles in order to achieve a mutually agreeable compromise.
When people don’t like and don’t trust the other side, they are less willing to make those kinds of sacrifices. When people don’t trust the other side, they are less likely to believe the other side’s promises about the future benefits of a proposed policy. Without a willingness to make sacrifices and compromise, the process of legislating grinds to a halt.
Indeed, the 112th and 113th Congresses, which served from 2011-14, were the least productive ones since scholars began to measure congressional productivity in the 1940s. Although the American people tell pollsters that their views on the issues remain relatively moderate and they want their leaders in Washington to compromise, they perpetuate polarization in Washington by continuing to elect ideologically extreme representatives. The public did not create the governing crisis in Washington, but the polarization of political trust reinforces it.
What’s a good example of how this plays out?
The story of the Affordable Care Act nicely illustrates the consequences of polarized political trust. Republicans are, generally speaking, ideologically predisposed to oppose big government programs. In order to support a big government initiative like Obamacare, they must be willing to sacrifice some of their ideological preferences. Polls frequently showed that Republicans were more likely than Democrats to believe that Obamacare would require them to sacrifice both their ideological and their material interests.
Trust can serve as a reservoir that policymakers can draw on to encourage those not ideologically predisposed to follow them to give their ideas a shot. This reservoir has run dry. Without such trust, members of one party are less inclined to consider the policy proposals of the other party.
The Affordable Care Act was, of course, eventually enacted, but it passed without a single Republican vote and was only made possible through the use of bruising, seldom-used legislative tactics such as the reconciliation process.