Identity Sorting and Political Compromise

In this article, I explore the relationship between sorting and the value that individuals assign to compromise. Analyzing four separate, nationally-representative surveys from 2007 to 2016, I show that a reliable asymmetry among partisans exists regarding their preference for political leaders who compromise. Among persons with right-leaning identities, high levels of overlap between partisanship and ideology undercut the professed desirability of compromise and amplify the association between compromise and selling out one’s principles. However, when individuals are asked about the specific extent to which one’s “side” deserves greater deference in the policymaking process, differences between persons with left- and right-leaning identities disappear. Well-sorted individuals are uniformly unwilling to distribute policymaking demands equally. Although this disconnect is emblematic of the general tension between abstract principles and episodic behavior (or “practicing what you preach”), it also highlights how the introduction of material threat may challenge expressive commitments to lofty ideals