Author Archives: Laurel Harbridge-Yong/Northwestern University

Laurel Harbridge-Yong is associate professor of political science at Northwestern University. Her teaching and research focuses on partisan conflict and the lack of bipartisan agreement in American politics. Her research examines why Congressional parties prioritize partisan conflict, focusing on both institutional changes and public preferences for bipartisanship. Her 2015 book, Is Bipartisanship Dead? (Cambridge University Press), explores how party leaders in the House of Representatives changed from prioritizing legislation with bipartisan agreement in the 1970s to prioritizing legislation with partisan disagreement by the 1990s. Her newest book, Rejecting Compromise: Legislators' Fear of Primary Voters (2020, Cambridge University Press) examines how legislators' perceptions of primary voters is an obstacle to legislative compromise, and examines what types of reforms can increase compromise.

She earned her Ph.D. at Stanford University in 2009 and her work has been published in the American Journal of Political Science, Legislative Studies Quarterly, Political Behavior, and American Politics Research, among others. This research has been supported by the National Science Foundation Time Sharing Experiments in the Social Sciences (TESS), the Social Science Research Council, and the Dirksen Congressional Center. She is actively engaged with the Institute for Policy Research, the Applied Quantitative Methods Workshop, and the American Politics Workshop.
Posted inEditor's Choice

Voters want compromise in Congress – so why the brinkmanship over the debt ceiling?

by Laurel Harbridge-Yong/Northwestern University

Research shows that the public does not like gridlock on issues in which people agree on the end goal. The public, on average, even prefers a victory for the other side over policy gridlock.
A win for their own side is the best outcome, a compromise is next best, a win for the other side is next best after that. Gridlock is the worst outcome.

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