Preface.
This is a book review of “Conservatives without Conscience” by John Dean.
It is the best book I’ve read in explaining the history of conservatism and authoritarianism. Almost a year before Trump was elected in 2016, Politico wrote that “…the one trait that predicts a Trump voter is not race, income, or education: it’s authoritarianism. Because of the prevalence of authoritarians in the American electorate found in twice as many Republicans as democrats, it’s likely that Trump’s fan base will continue to grow. Political pollsters have missed this key component of Trump’s support because they simply don’t include questions about authoritarianism in their polls…”
Easley (2021) summarized research showing much higher rates of Americans being right-wing authoritarian (RWA), 26% of them, than other democracies: Twice as high as in Europe, Australia, and Canada. RWA beliefs include believing voter fraud determined the 2020 election, that Capitol rioters were defending the government, and that masks and vaccines are not crucial for stopping COVID-19. High-RWA tended to be older, right-leaning, and rural with less college education. This is hard to change since studies have been done that show this tendency may be very genetic. Twin studies show this tendency ranges from 10 to 25%.
And this article found that men who strongly believed in the culturally definition of masculinity predicted who voted for Trump, a trait also associated with racism, sexism, less trust of government, and xenophobia.
Right-wing religious groups are the Republican party, with 82% of white evangelical protestants voting for him and 74% of Pentecostals. So did 63% of Hispanic protestants and 61% of white Catholics, and 58% of white non-evangelical protestants. The groups who overwhelmingly vote Democratic are atheists, agnostics, Jewish Americans, black protestants, and religiously unaffiliated Americans.
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