Why Do Party Activists Convert? An Analysis of Individual-Level Change on the Abortion Issue

Abstract

The conversion of continuing party activists to new policy positions plays an important role in the process of partisan change. Although a number of scholars have shown that conversion among continuing activ ists at the aggregate level contributes to overall ideological change within the parties, political scientists have devoted little attention to the factors associated with attitudinal conversion among individual activists. In this article, we develop a model of the individual-level conversion process and test it using panel data on the abortion attitudes of a national sample of continuing party activists. The results indicate that a number of factors distinguish those activists who convert as their parties' ideological posi tions change from those activists who do not. These factors include an activist's candidate preferences and general ideological orientations, the religious and political groups to which an activist belongs, the types of incentives that motivate an activist's political activity, and the political environment in the party in an activist's home state.