Regional Subcultures of the United States
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Cleveland State University EngagedScholarship@CSU Political Science Faculty Publications Political Science Department 11-1993 Regional Subcultures of the United States Joel A. Lieske Cleveland State University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/clpolsci_facpub Part of the Political Science Commons How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! Publisher's Statement Copyright 1993 Cambridge University Press. Available on publisher's site at http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0022381600076234. Original Citation Lieske, Joel. 1993. "Regional Subcultures of the United States." Journal of Politics 55:888-913. Repository Citation Lieske, Joel A., "Regional Subcultures of the United States" (1993). Political Science Faculty Publications. 11. https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/clpolsci_facpub/11 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Political Science Department at EngagedScholarship@CSU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Political Science Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of EngagedScholarship@CSU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. RegionalSubcultures of the UnitedStates Joel Lieske ClevelandState University This study develops the case, theory, and statisticalmethodology for a new measureof American regional subcultures.Using principalcomponent and cluster analysis on some 45 measuresof racial origin, ethnic ancestry,religious affiliation,and social structure,I show how the entire populationof U.S. counties can be partitionedinto 10 distinctive, regionalsubcultures that are relativelyhomoge- neous and contiguous. Next, I identify the cultural characteristicsof each subcultureand relate my new classificationscheme to the work of Elazar,Gastil, Garreau,and Fischer. Finally, I comparethe relative utility of this new measurewith Elazar'stypology in explainingthe variationin a number of social, political,and policy indicators. More work, in our view, needs to be done, to ascertain whether the cultural clusters that Elazar designates do indeed exist (either at the mass or elite level). This step, it seems to us, should precede attempts to link public policy outputs with political cultures. Unfortu- nately most work has startedwith the second step and assumed the first. (Thompson, Ellis, and Wildavsky1990, 245) ]wenty-seven years ago, Elazar(1984) advanceda revolutionarynew theory of American regional subcultures. This new theory was designed to help explain variationsin the politicalprocesses, institutional structures, political behavior, and policies and programsof state and local government.In short, Elazarargued that subculturaldifferences could help us understand:(1) what state and local govern- ments do, (2) how they are organized,(3) what political rules they observe, and (4) who participatesin the politicalprocess (Press and VerBurg1983). To expedite this task, Elazardeveloped a geopoliticalmapping of the United States that classifies states and local regions into one or a combinationof three political subcultures:individualistic, moralistic, and traditionalistic.In Elazar's typology, there are a total of nine different subculturalclassifications that repre- sent dominantand subordinatecombinations of his three "core"subcultures. His mappingincludes some 50 state and 224 substatedesignations. Since Elazaradvanced his theory, other scholarshave developedtheir own cul- tural classificationschemes and produced their own cultural mappings of the This study owes a heavy intellectualdebt to Dan Elazar,Aaron Wildavsky, and my departedfriend and colleague,Tom Flinn. None of these individuals,of course, bearsany responsibilityfor any errors of analysis or interpretation.I also wish to thank Elazar, the Center for the Study of Federalismat Temple University,and ClevelandState Universityfor their financialsupport of my research. THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, Vol. 55, No. 4, November 1993, Pp. 888-913 C 1993 by the Universityof Texas Press RegionalSubcultures of the United States 889 United States (Luttbeg 1971; Zelinsky 1973; Gastil 1975; Garreau1981; Morgan and England 1987). However, Luttbeg's (1971) and Morganand England's(1987) classificationschemes are the only mappingsbased on replicable,statistical proce- dures. And Elazar's(1984) typology is the only one that has been subjected to extensiveempirical tests. In reviewingthis literature,Kincaid and I (1991)identify approximately 100 stud- ies that have subjectedElazar's thesis or a subculturalvariation to empiricaltests (e.g., Sharkansky1969; Weber and Shaffer 1972; Johnson 1976; Joslyn 1980; Lowery and Sigelman 1982; Herzik 1985; Fitzpatrickand Hero 1988; Nardulli 1990;Morgan and Watson 1991; Dran, Albritton,and Wyckoff 1991). But as we note, one of the most frequentcriticisms made of this developingliterature con- cerns the difficultiesof measuringpolitical culture. It is well-knownthat Elazar's derivationof the three politicalsubcultures is not based on any rigorousstatistical procedures.Neither are his geopoliticaldesignations based on any empiricaldata, other than historical migrationpatterns, personal field observations,interviews, and scholarly studies of America'sregions2_sections, and ethnoreligiousgroups. Moreover, Elazarhas not adjustedhis mapping of the three subculturesfor the pervasive cultural changes that have occurred in American society. Indeed, his conceptof "culturalgeology" allows for overlayand change.But his state and sub- state classificationsare the same today as they were 27 yearsago. Yet another criticism of Elazar'sclassification scheme is the crudeness of his state and regionaldesignations. According to Elazar(1970, 236), political culture can be definedas the persistent,generational patterns of politicalattitudes, values, beliefs, and behaviorthat characterizea group of people who live in geographical proximity.But what constitutes distinctive subculturesis often a very subjective judgment.And when the geographicalboundaries of a subcultureinclude entire states or large substate regions, there is not a great deal of empiricalprecision. Since the county is the basic unit of state government,it would seem desirableto develop measures that differentiateAmerican subcultures at least down to the county level. A final criticism of many culturalclassification schemes, including Elazar's,is their circularity.Thus, it is often alleged that Elazar'stypology relies, in part, on informationabout past politicalbehavior to predict currentor future politicalbe- havior. To get around this difficulty, Kincaid and I (1991) have proposed the developmentof new subculturalmeasures exclusively based on what Elazarhas called the "sources"of political culture such as racial origin, ethnic ancestry, religious affiliation, and social structure. This focus would exclude from the derivationof any new measuresthe confounding"manifestations" and "effects"of culture,i.e., politicalbehavior and institutionalarrangements. The purposeof this study is to develop and analyzea new measureof American subculturethat has these properties: 1. It is derivablefrom an explicit and replicableset of mathematicaland statistical algorithms. 890 Joel Lieske 2. It reflectscurrent cultural conditions. 3. It distinguishessubcultural differences down to the county level. 4. It is based entirelyon "nonpolitical"measures of Americanculture. To achievethese objectives,I will first discuss the theoreticallogic that undergirds my new measure. Next I will present the statisticalmethodology on which it is based. After this, I will discuss the distinguishing characteristicsof each sub- culture and relate my classificationscheme to the work of Elazar (1984), Gastil (1975), Garreau(1981), and Fischer (1989). Finally, since Elazar'stypology is the only one that has been subjectedto extensive empiricalanalysis, I will test the em- pirical utility of my new measurerelative to his. This will be done by comparing their relative ability to explain the variationin a number of social, political, and policy indicators. A MODELOF AMERICANREGIONAL SUBCULTURES As Kincaid and I (1991) argue elsewhere,1the peoples who settled the United States came with distinctive ethnoreligiousidentities, cultural preferences,and ways of life (Fischer 1989). In most cases, these traditions shaped both their choices of and responsesto the environment.Generally, groups settled in clusters, not as randomlydispersed individuals. And as they pushed inland, as in the west- ward migrationof British-Americansacross the entire continent, they took with them and transmitted to future generations the values, beliefs, attitudes, and behavior of their forebears(Holbrook 1950). Moreover, given the pervasiveness of local self-goverment that constituted the American democraticexperiment, groups could give significantsocial and politicalexpression to their culturalpref- erences within geographicallydefined political jurisdictions, namely, towns, town- ships, cities, and counties (Kincaid 1982). This gave an advantageto the early settlers who founded the first local and state governments(Zelinsky 1973; Gastil 1975). Unless they could numericallyoverwhelm these early settlers, laterarrivals had to contend with and adapt themselves to existing social and political power structures. Based on this historicalrecord, American subcultures should be dispersed,but not balkanized,across the countryin explicablepatterns or mosaicsthat are rooted in political jurisdictions.In addition, single subculturesor distinctive multicul-