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A fresh look at how interest groups mobilize their members and the effects that follow.

Most contemporary accounts of interest group politics emphasize how contemporary interest groups mirror and exacerbate partisan polarization, and understandably so: many of the largest and most visible coalitions do just this. But the term “interest groups” masks considerable variety. Despite what many seem to believe, the majority of interest groups are bipartisan, and, as Amy D. Meli shows, even when groups have a clear affinity with one party over the other, many still choose to pursue a bipartisan strategy.

In Mobilized, Meli develops a method for identifying the partisanship of interest groups and explores how different types of groups communicate with their members. She finds that groups adopting bipartisan policy strategies lobby and mobilize their members differently than those who choose partisan strategies. This, in turn, influences how their members perceive government and politics, leading people involved with these groups to have higher efficacy and lower levels of affective polarization. For decades, we have understood that higher levels of political involvement result in higher levels of polarization, but Meli shows that when involvement is mediated by bipartisan interest groups, affective polarization levels actually go down. Bipartisan groups advocate on issues they care about, and, most of the time, they do so with some support from both parties.

As the high drama of national elections keeps watchers on the edge of their seats, a different phenomenon altogether characterizes the politics of the American states: long-term one-party monopolies. Widely (and wrongly) assumed to be specific to the South, one-party domination is as ubiquitous as it is consequential. Monopoly Rule documents the startling pervasiveness of state party monopolies since the 1930s.

Even in the “battleground states” of recent presidential elections, Janine A. Parry and Zoe Nemerever make the case that one party or the other usually holds a large and enduring advantage outside the presidential contest. Using a novel State Party Control Index, the authors demonstrate the troubling effects of these partisan juggernauts, including upticks in elite malfeasance, voter complacency, and democratic backsliding. Despite the renewed willingness of contemporary party elites to advance their electoral success by rigging the rules, Monopoly Rule argues that contemporary state and local experiments in ranked choice voting, independent redistricting, and campaign finance reform offer options for reinvigorating the health of American democracy.

New England politics can, at first blush, appear monochromatic. After all, only one member of the entire region’s delegation to the US Congress is a Republican, and citizens have elected few Republicans to the US House or Senate in the last decade. But this has not always been the case. In 1948, only two states in the region–Rhode Island and Connecticut–had Democratic senators. Yet a closer examination of the region today reveals fascinating political variation. Liberal policies, greater diversity, and engaged political movements are reshaping stereotypical Yankee tendencies of close-fisted government, whiteness, and laconic discourse.

This collection of new essays captures both the political history and contemporary moment in this region and exposes the surprisingly varied political landscape. It examines historical shifts, regional developments, and the politics of its states to argue that New England has been and continues to be an important part of the national political puzzle, from demonstrating democratic principles in early America to producing major contemporary figures such as Elizabeth Warren, Ayanna Pressley, and Susan Collins. The political shifts at work in New England mirror the South’s transformation, but have received much less attention. This volume corrects that omission by profiling political movements and candidates, political rhetoric from activists to pundits, and demographics and voting in each state as well as the region as a whole.

In addition to material by the editors, this important collection includes contributions from Rachael V. Cobb, Jerold Duquette, Christopher J. Galdieri, Jane JaKyung Han, Douglas B. Harris, Luis Jiménez, Scott McLean, James Melcher, Maureen Moakley, Paul Petterson, and Dante J. Scala.