Abstract
Abstract
This paper examines how increasing concentration of political power affects political mobilization in democracies. Building on theories of social mobilization, electoral nationalization, and political information, the paper argues that as political authority becomes increasingly centralized, structural cleavages rooted in socioeconomic position become less effective mechanisms of political organization relative to constructed cleavages based on durable social identities.As citizens become less able to directly observe, monitor, and evaluate political outcomes, identity-based cleavages become increasingly valuable informational shortcuts. Electoral nationalization reinforces this process by encouraging political competition to be organized around broad national coalitions rather than localized economic interests.The argument is evaluated using pooled data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study (CCES) and the Cooperative Election Study (CES) for the presidential election years 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020, and 2024. Logistic regression results indicate that identity-based variables explain substantially more variation in nationalized voting than traditional socioeconomic characteristics.