Neighborhoods That Matter: How Place and People Affect Political Participation

• Author: Carrie LeVan
• DOI: 10.1177/1532673X19852370
• Published date: 01 March 2020
• Date: 01 March 2020
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/1532673X19852370

American Politics Research

2020, Vol. 48(2) 286 –294

© The Author(s) 2019

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DOI: 10.1177/1532673X19852370

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Article

Introduction

That residential context affects individual political behavior is

well established in the literature. Previous research shows that

the sociodemographic composition and the partisan/ideologi-

cal diversity of neighborhoods influence political participation

(Cho, Gimpel, & Dyck, 2006; Costa & Kahn, 2003; Enos,

2016, 2018; McClurg, 2006; Mutz, 2002a, 2002b; Oliver,

2001). Less understood is how the physical composition (i.e.,

the built environment) might also impact political participa-

tion. I want to better understand how, in addition to social con-

text, the physical characteristics of neighborhoods affect

political behavior.

The notion that the built environment might also affect

political behavior is not new. In 1961, Jane Jacobs described

the typical urban neighborhood as a place where neighbors

knew each other’s names, talked on street corners, and

bumped into each other at the local delicatessen. For Jacobs,

and many scholars who followed (Calthorpe & Fulton, 2001;

Duany & Plater-Zyberk, 1995; Duany, Plater-Zyberk, &

Speck, 2000; Jackson, 1985; Kennedy, 1978; Kohn, 2004;

Leydon, 2003; Lofland, 1998; Oldenburg, 1999; Oliver,

2001; Putnam, 2000), these unplanned social interactions

between neighbors played an integral role in influencing

individual political behavior, because these encounters on

city streets helped develop an individual’s desire to engage in

community life (Jacobs, 1961). Central to Jacobs’s descrip-

tion of why these unplanned interactions took place was the

physical characteristics of these neighborhoods.

Social scientists have begun testing these claims about

physical context, but the research has had design limitations.

Past studies have relied on measures at high levels of aggre-

gation, like city, despite the fact that neighborhood design

may vary greatly within these larger geographic areas (Oliver,

2001). Measures for design, like the percentage of a census

tract commuting, have also been used to try and capture the

physical characteristics of neighborhood, but these measures

present potential problems of measurement error (Hopkins &

Williamson, 2012; Oliver, 2001, 2003). And although past

studies assert that the reason neighborhood design affects par-

ticipation is because it influences talk between neighbors,

studies have lacked measurement of this neighborly contact

they claim happens between design and participation (Duany

& Plater-Zyberk, 1995; Duany et al., 2000; Hopkins &

Williamson, 2012; Jackson, 1985; Oliver, 2001).

This article attempts to improve how physical context is

measured and to test the claims of previous scholars that

neighborly contact mediates the effects of neighborhood

design and individual participation. It begins with a nation-

ally representative survey with measures of the frequency of

neighbor interaction and individual participation. To the sur-

vey, I merged respondents’ census tract information and then

used Google Maps images to code respondents’ neighbor-

hood design features. With it, I test whether or not neighbor-

hoods with interactive design characteristics—sidewalks,

852370APRXXX10.1177/1532673X19852370American Politics ResearchLeVan

research-article2019

1Colby College, Waterville, ME, USA

Corresponding Author:

Carrie LeVan, Department of Government, Colby College, 4000

Mayflower Hill, Waterville, ME 04901, USA.

Email: calevan@colby.edu

Neighborhoods That Matter: How Place

and People Affect Political Participation

Carrie LeVan1

Abstract

Well established in the literature is that social context, like the racial or partisan composition of neighborhoods, affects individual

political behavior. Less understood is how the design of neighborhoods may also influence these behaviors. This article seeks to

improve how physical context is measured and to examine how the built environment subsequently affects individual political

participation. Using a nationally representative survey with measures of the frequency of neighbor interaction and individual voter

turnout and to which I merged respondents’ census tract information and then used Google Maps images to code respondents’

neighborhood design features, I show how the physical structure of residential places—whether homes have porches, streets

are tree-lined, neighborhoods have natural gathering places—promotes neighborly exchanges that subsequently affect individual

voter turnout.

Keywords

political participation, voter turnout, social capital, social network, neighborhood design