9.7 Gerrymandering

One modern influence on the political landscape comes from the rise in democratic governments. In a democracy, most governments draw up functional regions called electoral districts or voting districts to determine who may vote for whom, which areas are represented by a specific government office (mayor, senator, governor, etc.) and which laws govern the actions of which regions. The smallest American electoral region is the precinct, which, at least in urban areas, is roughly “your neighborhood,” usually consisting of a few city blocks. You may vote only in the precinct assigned to your home address, and this precinct is typically part of multiple, larger, nested electoral districts, like wards, townships, counties, congressional districts, states, etc. Most of the time, electoral districts have roughly the same number of people in each equivalent district. So for example, in 2011, each of California’s 80 State Assembly Districts had between 461,000 and 470,000 people. Each district has almost the same population as its neighbor. Efforts are made to keep all such districts similarly sized, so when a district loses or gains population, the boundaries must be redrawn to ensure even representation and avoid over or underrepresentation called malapportionment.

Every ten years, after the decennial US Census is completed, the US Constitution requires electoral districts must be redrawn following the census results. This process, known as political redistricting, involves a great deal of geographic strategizing, and the outcome of this process fundamentally shapes American politics. In most US states, the state legislature controls the redistricting process, and this fact opens the process to unfair political practices. The reason why the political redistricting process is so important is that elections are heavily influenced by the manner in which the boundaries of electoral districts are drawn. Political groups that control the placement of boundaries are far more likely to control who gets elected, which laws get passed and how tax money is collected and spent

Each redistricting cycle, politicians in many locations, are accused of purposefully constructing political district boundaries to favor one group (Democrats, Latinos, labor unions, gun advocates, e.g.) over another. The construction of unfair districts is called Gerrymandering. The odd term, “Gerrymander” comes from a newspaper story that characterized the unfair redistricting map of South Essex County in Massachusetts in 1812. The map of the redrawn districts strongly favored Massachusetts’ governor at the time, Elbridge Gerry. The shape of one district was so distorted that reporters suggested it looked like a salamander, thus providing the two words that became the halves of the term used today to describe the process of creating unfair political districts.

Check out this video that explains gerrymandering well:

There are several different strategies that politicians use to gerrymander districts. Where there is little cooperation between political parties (or other interest groups), politicians may pursue strategies that aggressively seek to limit the political influence of opposition groups.

If the opposition (or ethnic minority) party is small enough, then the controlling group may draw lines through the minority areas, minimizing the opposition’s ability to influence the outcome of elections in as many regions as possible. This process, called cracking, has commonly been used to divide inner-city ethnic minority groups into multiple districts each dominated numerically by whites.

If the opposition grows too numerous to split, then group controlling the redistricting process may draw district lines so that the opposition is dominant in a few districts, or even a single district to minimize the power of the opposition in the overall system. That strategy is called packing. Even a statistical minority can control power by carefully packing the majority group into cleverly drawn district boundaries.

There are dozens of other techniques by which one group can control the political power of others through manipulating election boundaries. However, it is likely that the most common unfairly drawn electoral district is the so-called sweetheart gerrymander drawn up cooperatively by incumbents from opposing political parties in order to help maintain the status quo. This involves drawing up safe districts, which clearly favor one party over the other, ensuring maintenance of the status quo and nearly guaranteeing uncompetitive general elections – the primary elections may still be competitive. The most controversial type of districts are those based on race, and whether minority groups benefit or are harmed by minority-majority districts.

Due to the perceived negative issues associated with gerrymandering and its effect on competitive elections and democratic accountability, numerous countries have enacted reforms making the practice either more difficult or less effective. Countries such as the U.K., Australia, Canada and most of those in Europe have transferred responsibility for defining constituency boundaries to neutral or cross-party bodies.

Under these systems, an independent, and presumably objective, commission is created specifically for redistricting, rather than having the legislature do it. This is the system used in the United Kingdom, where the independent boundary commissions determine the boundaries for constituencies in the House of Commons and the devolved legislatures, subject to ratification by the body in question (almost always granted without debate). A similar situation exists in Australia where the independent Australian Electoral Commission and its state-based counterparts determine electoral boundaries for federal, state and local jurisdictions.

To help ensure neutrality, members of a redistricting agency may be appointed from relatively apolitical sources such as retired judges or longstanding members of the civil service, possibly with requirements for adequate representation among competing political parties. Additionally, members of the board can be denied access to information that might aid in gerrymandering, such as the demographic makeup or voting patterns of the population.