POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY

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POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY
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Topics in Political Geography

• Political culture
• Electoral geography
• Gerrymandering
• Political iconography

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Political culture and electoral geography
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Would you expect to see the equivalent warning in
the US?Why not?
SMOKING KILLS
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Political Culture varies from place to place

• In Europe individual welfare is placed above the
  interests of companies and economic growth
• In the US companies and economic growth are
  favored even when it adversely affects individual
  health, safety and welfare
• Americans value freedom but tend to overlook
  ways in which collective choices impinge on
  individual freedom, leaving people to their own
  (unequal) resources

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map of political cultures in the U.S.

• Source Daniel Elazar
• Traditionalistic
• Family-based social order (patriarchal,
  anti-gov., racial hierarchy)
• Individualistic
• Pressure-group politics
• Moralistic
• Government as legitimate protector of the public
  good
• Ethnic
• Government as protector of ethnic identity

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Political culture region (formal)

• Goldwater was a conservative Republican who
  called for less government, a strong military,
  and the end of federal welfare programs he lost
  to Johnson.
• Wallace was a defender of racial segregation and
  personally stood in the way of Black students who
  were attempting to attend the University of
  Alabama

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Barry Goldwater quotes

• The income tax created more criminals than any
  other single act of government.
• A government that is big enough to give you all
  you want is big enough to take it all away.
• You've got to forget about this civilian.
  Whenever you drop bombs, you're going to hit
  civilians.
• I could have ended the war in a month. I could
  have made North Vietnam look like a mud puddle.

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George Wallace quotes

• I draw the line in the dust and toss the
  gauntlet before the feet of tyranny, and I say
  segregation now, segregation tomorrow,
  segregation forever.
• I've read about foreign policy and studied -- I
  know the number of continents.

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George Wallaces 1963 speech at the University of
Alabama

• The unwelcomed, unwanted, unwarranted and
  force-induced intrusion upon the campus of the
  University of Alabama today of the might of the
  Central Government offers frightful example of
  the oppression of the rights, privileges and
  sovereignty of this State by officers of the
  Federal Government. This intrusion results solely
  from force, or threat of force, undignified by
  any reasonable application of the principle of
  law, reason and justice. It is important that the
  people of this State and nation understand that
  this action is in violation of rights reserved to
  the State by the Constitution of the United
  States and the Constitution of the State of
  Alabama. While some few may applaud these acts,
  millions of Americans will gaze in sorrow upon
  the situation existing at this great institution
  of learning.
• Only the Congress makes the law of the United
  States. To this date no statutory authority can
  be cited to the people of this Country which
  authorizes the Central Government to ignore the
  sovereignty of this State in an attempt to
  subordinate the rights of Alabama and millions of
  Americans. There has been no legislative action
  by Congress justifying this intrusion.

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George Wallaces 1963 speech at the University of
Alabama

• When the Constitution of the United States was
  enacted, a government was formed upon the premise
  that people, as individuals are endowed with the
  rights of life, liberty, and property, and with
  the right of self-government. The people and
  their local self-governments formed a Central
  Government and conferred upon it certain stated
  and limited powers. All other powers were
  reserved to the states and to the people.
• Strong local government is the foundation of our
  system and must be continually guarded and
  maintained. The Tenth Amendment to the
  Constitution of the United States reads as
  follows
• "The powers not delegated to the United States by
  the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the
  States, are reserved to the states respectively,
  or to the people."

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Voting patterns

• Voting patterns reveal political culture regions,
  such as the South
• These are a type of formal culture region
• Political culture links to attitudes about
  authority, in general, which in turn ties in to
  attitudes about gender roles

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Regional attitudes about sexual preference
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Education Funding
Aside What is your judgment of the cartographic
quality of this thematic map?
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Geography of the Death Penalty
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Cause or Effect?
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The 1956 Presidential Election
Rep.
Rep.
Dem.
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The 1960 Presidential Election
Rep.
Dem.
Dem.
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The 1964 Presidential Election
Dem.
Dem.
Rep.
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The 1968 Presidential Election
Rep.
Dem.
Indep.
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The 1972 Presidential Election
Rep.
Rep.
Rep.
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The 1976 Presidential Election
Rep.
Dem.
Dem.
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The 1980 Presidential Election
Rep.
Dem.
Rep.
Rep.
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The 1984 Presidential Election
Rep.
Dem.
Rep.
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The 1988 Presidential Election
Dem.
Dem.
Rep.
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The 1992 Presidential Election
Dem.
Dem.
Rep.
Rep.
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The 1996 Presidential Election
Similar to Goldwater pattern
Dem.
Dem.
Rep.
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The 2000 Presidential Election
Dem.
Dem.
Sim. to Goldwater pattern
Rep.
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2004 presidential election
Why was Bushs lead less clear-cut than it looks
here?
From http//www.electoral-vote.com/index.html
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Electoral vote cartogram
Population determines electoral votes High
population density in NE/Midwest and low
population density in non-coastal West led to a
close race How could this map be more informative?
From http//www.electoral-vote.com/index.html
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Is this a chicken that got steam-rollered??
No. Guess again!
Cartogram divided by county and colored according
to a set of classifications (rather than just
red/blue or continuous shading)
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What do the parties stand for?

• Its not always how it seems!

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Clinton
Bush
Bush
Reagan
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Strongholds

• What appear to be the Democratic and Republican
  strongholds in the US?
• Does scale affect your answer?
• What regions have realigned themselves?

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Regional Political Culture

• The US contains a variety of political cultures
• These cultures are formed by a range of different
  attitudes on racial issues, womens rights,
  taxation, authority, etc.
• These cultures shape election outcomes, but aside
  from strongholds most states will occasionally
  break out of their normal pattern in response to
  a popular presidential candidate
• Currently the West Coast, Northeast, and Upper
  Midwest are at odds with the South and the
  Continental West
• The state level of aggregation misses much of the
  variation in political culture between rural and
  urban America

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Term gerrymander was coined in an 1811
political cartoon mocking a Massachusetts
districting scheme carried out under Governor
Elbridge Gerry Source Fellman, Getis Getis
Human Geography
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gerrymandering

• Many people disapprove of gerrymandering in
  principle
• In practice, gerrymanders come from both dominant
  and oppressed groups
• guarantees minority representatives in
  legislative bodies
• simultaneously reduces the influence of minority
  voters on the selection of non-minority
  representatives
• tests implicit assumptions about communities of
  interest in democratic politics
• in essence, it reveals a tug-of-war between
  place-based definitions of "community" and ethnic
  definitions of "community"

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gerrymandering

• The project in your discussion section will
  illustrate a few basic ideas
• Districting has a MASSIVE impact on the outcome
  of the democratic process
• Whoever draws the jurisdictional boundaries can
  tilt the balance of power in their favor unless
  they are greatly outnumbered
• Clustered groups are most vulnerable to
  gerrymandering
• Long, thin districts with convoluted (wiggly)
  borders are a telltale sign of gerrymandering

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A famous gerrymander
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Politics of Redistricting

• Republicans took control of TX state legislature
  in 2002 (with some illegal funding methods), then
  in 2003 with the aid of House Majority Leader Tom
  Delay they redrew the US congressional boundaries
  according to a plan explicitly designed to
  strengthen Republicans and weaken Democrats
• Democrats tried to stop this by every means
  possible (including the unconventional tactic of
  leaving the state en masse) but they failed to
  stop the redistricting
• This redistricting amounted to a gerrymander that
  helped the GOP retain its nationwide majority in
  the US House of Representatives
• Delay was forced to resign in 2006 for
  involvement in money laundering and conspiracy
• More info on the gerrymander
• More info on Delay

Tom Delay
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Before
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After
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Percent Hispanic by census tract in South Texas
a problem!
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Packing and cracking
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Why are the boundaries drawn this way?

• Look for clues in the demographics of these areas
• Specifically, look in American FactFinder
  accessible from the US Census website

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(No Transcript)
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Harris County (Houston) Percent White
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Harris County (Houston) Percent Black
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Harris County (Houston) Percent Hispanic/Latino
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Harris County (Houston)
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(No Transcript)
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black
black
black
black
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black
Hispanic
Hispanic
Hispanic
black
black
black
Hispanic
mixed
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POLITICS OF A SYMBOL

• The conflict over Georgias flag

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The Confederate Battle Flag
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The Old Georgia Flag(-2001)
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2001-2003
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(No Transcript)
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A Better New Georgia Flag(2003-?)
2003 brought another new flag, plus a vote by the
state legislature to permanently rule out the use
of the Confederate Battle Flag for the state flag
(passed by only 1 vote)
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The First Official Confederate Flag
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What is a flag?

• A flag is a symbol of a state or nation
• Like other symbols it is overrun by meaning
  broad, almost infinite associations with social
  order, personal identity, values, morals,
  religion, etc.
• Like other symbols, it can be mistreated in
  ways that does not just symbolize an attack on
  the entity it stands for, but is actually taken
  to be an attack on that entity

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Teaching patriotism

• Is this necessary to do so? Is it good?
• Why does the Pledge of Allegiance contain the
  words under God?
• Under God was added in 1954 by Congress in
  response to Cold-War perception of Russia as
  godless and therefore evil
• Saying of the pledge in school was declared
  unconstitutional by a US district judge in
  California (9-14-2005)
• How many nations have a pledge to their flag?
• 2 (the US and the Philippines)

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Flag Burning
Should burning of the US flag be illegal in the
US? No. According to the Supreme Court (Texas
v. Johnson, 1989) Yes Most states still have
flag-burning bans on their books that have not
yet been challenged
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How can each of the following symbolize the
nation or state?

• A map
• A museum
• A language
• A sport
• A weapons system
• A building
• A history book
• A restaurant
• A religion
• A monument
• A cartoon