An LSU Manship School Assistant Professor says his research shows the loss of local media can make towns a lot more partisan. Joshua Darr says the study was a joint effort with researchers from Colorado State and Texas A&M, where they analyzed the rate of voters who turned in ballots supporting candidates from more than one party.
“We compared counties that have and have not lost newspapers that are very similar on a lot of important statistics, which is when we found the effect of about 1.9 percent lower split ticketing in counties that have lost that paper.”
Darr says that’s because when local media dies, the often more heavily partisan national outlets fill the gap. He says that may Balkanize voters who previously may have spent more time considering the local issues when considering a candidate, and not just their party affiliation.
“People are seeing fewer distinctions between local politics and national politics. We think that might be, in part, because local media is suffering while national media is thriving.”
Darr says his research reinforced the importance of keeping local news alive and supported, so that local voters can be fully informed about local candidates history and positions on vital local issues, as opposed to just falling back on party line voting.
“Supporting your local news, whether it’s political or not, buying a local newspaper, subscribing to local magazines, listening to local radio, these things can help give us local options.”
