The De Gruyter Series in American Political Geography

The Deep South (or coastal South) has long been a stronghold for the Republican Party. While Appalachia and the upper South (or highland South) now also strongly support the GOP, delivering landslide victories for Republican candidates in recent elections, that part of the South underwent its own decisive shift in the last generation. This book explores this region’s partisan realignment in context of its unique terrain, culture, and history – and especially the character of “unhyphenated Americans,” predominantly White individuals whose ethnic identity is tied solely to the United States rather than a European country.

Studying US Census data, the book examines counties with significant populations of unhyphenated Americans to trace their place-based political evolution since the 1990s. Interpreting public opinion data, it illustrates the region’s distinct conservative views on issues like abortion, gay rights, race, immigration, guns, the war on terror and national security, and the environment. And analyzing electoral data, it reveals the steady rise in Republican vote share in national and local elections. Connecting these threads, it argues that – rather than economic decline, as commonly thought – it is the ethnic identity forged by these areas’ geographic and demographic homogeneity over centuries that explains this partisan shift.

This insightful work illuminates these developments’ consequences on the Republican coalition and the broader landscape of American democracy. It will be an essential read for scholars, students, journalists, policy professionals, and members of the curious public who are interested in Southern US politics, racial & ethnic politics, conservative & right-wing politics, political geography, political psychology & behavior, and rural sociology.