Stone Inequality & Social Policy Seminar: Jessica Trounstine

A Theory of Local Public Opinion

Jessica Trounstine, Centennial Chair and Professor of Political Science, Vanderbilt University

Abstract: A common narrative is that local politics has become polarized as partisan and ideological commitments defined at the national level have trickled down to local arenas. But local government responsibilities differ in fundamental ways from the responsibilities of the national government. We do not yet know if preferences and positions on local issues are related to national level party affiliations and ideologies, and we lack an overarching theory that would allow us to make predictions one way or the other.  In this paper, I ask how local public opinion is organized, why it is organized in this way, and whether this organization is correlated with national political structures of partisanship and ideology. Until now, no data has existed to answer these questions. Using historical case study evidence and a large survey focused on local politics I offer a theory of local public opinion. I argue that there are two fundamental dimensions that structure local public opinion: economics and space. These dimensions developed around the turn of the 20th century, pre-dating partisan and ideological commitments at the national level. Today, local public opinion is weakly correlated with party identification and liberal/conservative identity. Racism and nativism were driving forces behind the development of these dimensions, and they remain important contributors today. 

Jessica Trounstine is Centennial Chair and Professor of Political Science at Vanderbilt University.  Previously, she served as the Foundation Board of Trustees Presidential Chair and Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Merced and as an Assistant Professor of Politics and Public Policy at Princeton University.  Trounstine earned her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, San Diego in 2004.  She is the author of Segregation by Design: Local Politics and Inequality in American Cities (Cambridge University Press), winner of the Best Book in the Field from the Urban Affairs Association, the J. David Greenstone Prize, and the Best Book on Race, Ethnicity, and Urban Politics from the American Political Science Association.   She is also the author of the award winning book, Political Monopolies in American Cities: The Rise and Fall of Bosses and Reformers (University of Chicago Press), along with dozens of articles and book chapters.  She was selected as a 2022 Andrew Carnegie Fellow.  Trounstine’s work studies representation and inequality in American democracy using varied quantitative and qualitative methods.  She consults for various governments and community organizations; and serves on numerous editorial and foundation boards.