The Battle for the Soul of America: National Identity in the 2020 Election

• In Event: Fragmentation, Polarization and National Identity

Abstract

This paper provides the first comprehensive, contextual analysis of the role of national identity in American presidential campaign communication. It examines the extent to which presidential campaigns are structured by a much-observed cleavage in American political culture between civic and ethnic traditions of national identity. To do so, the paper conducts a comparative and contextual content analysis of all tweets sent by Donald Trump and Joe Biden during the 2020 campaign (n=4321). Using a new analytical framework that maps historically rooted myths and symbols associated with the civic and ethnic traditions of American national identity, the authors show how this content was reflected in each candidates’ messaging. In sum, the paper finds that the civic and ethnic traditions were relatively common in both campaigns – and that this was particularly the case with Trump. These findings suggest that the cleavage in political culture has eroded, such that there are instances when it is more appropriate to refer to one, merged, civic-ethnic tradition of American identity. One of the primary takeaways from this analysis is that deeply embedded civic ideas about America as a beacon of liberalism and democracy are being recast as exclusive, ethnic characteristics of white Americans. This process occurred frequently in Trump’s tweets about Muslims, Latin Americans, immigration, cities, and socialism – all of which he frequently associated with an inherent illiberalism, and therefore as “un-American.”

Authors

• Eric Taylor Woods, University of Plymouth

• Marcus Closen, University of Toronto

• Alexandre Fortier-Chouinard, University of Toronto

• Catherine Ouellet, University of Toronto

• Robert Schertzer, University of Toronto