A voting bloc is a group of voters that are strongly motivated by a specific common concern or group of concerns to the point that such specific concerns tend to dominate their voting patterns, causing them vote together in elections. For example, Beliefnet identifies 12 main religious blocs in American politics, including e.g. the "Religious Right", whose concerns are dominated by religious and sociocultural issues and "White Bread Protestants", who, while also conservative, tend to care more about economic issues. The result is that each of these groups votes en bloc in elections.
The divisions between voting blocs are known as cleavage. A voting bloc can be longstanding and institutionalized, such as support for business or labor, or it can be created from scratch as the result of the saliency of a new public issue, such as a war or the potential resumption of a military draft. Ethnic groups are sometimes considered to be voting blocs, but it is unwise to simply assume that a majority of a given ethnic group will vote in one particular way, as economic status and religious beliefs also play an important role. Voting blocs grow and wane according to the development of issues and personalities. These blocs can often disappear and reappear with time and are not necessarily motivated by one single issue.
Famous quotes containing the words voting and/or bloc:
“Common sense should tell us that reading is the ultimate weapon—destroying ignorance, poverty and despair before they can destroy us. A nation that doesn’t read much doesn’t know much. And a nation that doesn’t know much is more likely to make poor choices in the home, the marketplace, the jury box and the voting booth...The challenge, therefore, is to convince future generations of children that carrying a book is more rewarding than carrying guns.”
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