Date of Submission
Spring 2016
Academic Programs and Concentrations
Political Studies
Project Advisor 1
David Kettler
Abstract/Artist's Statement
By 2044, it is predicted that America will be a majority-minority country-- that is, a plurality of minorities will begin to outnumber white people. Some suggest that this demographic trend suggests the demise of the Republican party, thanks to their historical paucity of support amongst minority communities. This has been deemed the "Demographics as Destiny" theory. This paper argues that the theory of "Demographics as Destiny is based on four assumptions:
1) that the population of minority communities will continue to grow by leaps and bounds;
2) that minorities will soon register to vote and cast ballots in proportion to their share of the population;
3) that minorities will continue indefinitely to be a reliable part of the Democratic coalition;
4) that minority allegiance to the Democratic party will offset shifts along different variables, such as age.
The paper uses the case study of South Carolina's demographic shift to determine whether Demographics is becoming Destiny in the Palmetto State; examines the history of black and latino allegiance to the Democratic party and the Republican adoption of the "Southern Strategy" which formed the demographic bloc cohorts as they are understood today; identifies successful and unsuccessful strategies to GOTV in minority communities (as well as campaigns and NGOs which have utilized these strategies to greatest effect), offers an assessment of RNC and DNC strategy w/r/t bringing out voters of color, and examines accusations of voter suppression, voter fraud, and gerrymandering in the 2016 primary.
Access Agreement
Open Access
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Susman, Nathan Benjamin, "Assessing the Theory of Demographics as Destiny & Patterns of Bloc Voting in the United States" (2016). Senior Projects Spring 2016. 386.
https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_s2016/386
This work is protected by a Creative Commons license. Any use not permitted under that license is prohibited.
Included in
American Politics Commons, Civic and Community Engagement Commons, Community-Based Research Commons, Models and Methods Commons, Policy Design, Analysis, and Evaluation Commons, Policy History, Theory, and Methods Commons, Politics and Social Change Commons, Public Administration Commons, Public Affairs Commons, Public Policy Commons, Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies Commons, Race and Ethnicity Commons, Social Statistics Commons