From 2019 to 2020, Dr. Lynn Vavreck –professor of political science at UCLA and contributing columnist to The New York Times– and her colleagues interviewed over 500,000 voters, leading them to conclude that our politics aren’t just polarized, but calcified. According to the authors, “polarization — a blanket term that gets thrown around a lot in the media — doesn’t really do much to explain the situation we’re in. Yes, we're polarized. But talk to three different people, even three different political scientists, and you will get three different definitions of what polarization means. In the book, we use the term “calcification” because it better captures the features of American politics today."

In our conversation, Prof. Vavreck's framework helps us better understand what is happening in our politics by, among other things, illuminating the 2022 midterms and finding the difference between moderates and independents.

https://www.thepoliticalconversation.org/