The Politics of Resentment is an engaging, compelling, and provocative book about the state of public opinion in rural America today. Its theory, findings, and methodology all challenge longstanding assumptions about the nature of public opinion in the United States and about the way in which we should study it.

In terms of its theoretical lens, one should view The Politics of Resentment as broadening and deepening the psychological turn in political science that emphasizes the importance of identities. While scholars of political psychology and of racial and ethnic politics have long noted the centrality of identity to public opinion, “mainstream” political science research that focuses on the majority white population has been slow to adopt this approach. The concept of social identity is not new, of course. What is somewhat new is the extent to which the leading public opinion and political behavior scholars of our time are recognizing and demonstrating the power of social identities to determine the political predispositions of white Americans and to argue that public opinion can only be fully understood if we focus on identity rather than ideology. Scholars who have advanced this argument in recent years include Green, Palmquist and Schickler (Reference Green, Palmquist and Schickler2002), Bartels and Achen (Reference Achen and Bartels2016), Theiss-Morse (Reference Theiss-Morse2009), Huddy (Reference Huddy, Mason and Aarøe2015), and Iyengar (Reference Huddy, Mason and Aarøe2015; Reference Iyengar, Sood and Lelkes2012). To this list, we add Cramer.

In The Politics of Resentment, Cramer simultaneously draws our attention to an understudied yet important population in American politics while also situating the unique experiences of rural Americans within a vibrant and unsettled debate, namely the debate about whether poor and working class white Americans form preferences contrary to their economic interests because of social and cultural issues like gay marriage (Frank Reference Frank2007) or whether they form preferences that they think are based on their economic interests, but just do so poorly (Bartels Reference Bartels2008). Cramer illustrates how each of these perspectives is deficient. With her intensive ethnographic analysis, she demonstrates that white rural Americans form their preferences through a unique class- and place-based identity (and pride in that identity) and feelings of deprivation at the hands of the powerful political elite. It is this perspective, she argues, that leads to political preferences that might seem economically irrational to others. She labels this perspective rural consciousness, which combines three sets of beliefs: (1) that rural areas are ignored by people in power, (2) that rural areas do not get their fair share of public resources, and (3) that rural Americans have unique experiences and knowledge that are not understood or respected by leaders or by urban residents. It is this consciousness that unites white rural Americans with the Republican Party and its platform of small government rather than social issues or a misunderstanding of their own economic interests. The particulars illuminate Wisconsin, but the theory and ambition of the book are far broader.

The theory of rural consciousness builds nicely on the rich research tradition of group consciousness, which has traditionally been focused on the attitudes and behaviors of racial minorities and women. It also speaks to the value of descriptive representation in ensuring that the experiences and challenges that people of different backgrounds face are truly understood by those with decision-making authority.

In addition to developing an original argument about public opinion formation, Cramer provides a phenomenal example of how rigorous design and analysis of group interviews can inform scholarship on public opinion in ways that more traditional means of opinion analysis are simply unable to do. She is forthcoming with the benefits and limitations of her approach throughout the book, especially in chapter 2 (including the endnotes, an illuminating read in their own right). Cramer’s detailed explanation of her methods, the logic of her choices, and how her data collection evolved are a model for how to conduct research of this nature with rigor, transparency, and credibility despite the obvious challenges she has with regard to replication. We are in a transitional moment in empirical political science, with increasing calls for pre-registration of analysis, data access, and replication. The challenges that emerging standards in this regard pose for the kind of scholarship conducted for The Politics of Resentment might further serve to discourage research grounded in listening. The example set by Cramer will hopefully open the door for more public opinion scholars to consider incorporating qualitative approaches in their work, especially junior scholars who lack the protection of tenure when considering novel and potentially controversial research methods.

More of us can and should do ethnographic public opinion research in the United States. But is it the case that only Cramer could have done this research? How might the findings be different if Cramer herself were not a lifelong Wisconsinite with a Wisconsin accent? I didn’t even know that a person from Wisconsin is called a Wisconsinite; I would have said something like “Wisconsonsian.” Would that have prevented me from being able to study rural consciousness in Wisconsin as effectively as Cramer? If so, is that a problem? Or would my lack of connection to Wisconsin political culture provide an advantage? To her credit, Cramer embraces rather than shies away from these difficult questions. They can never be fully answered, but she makes a good case that we need research like hers anyway.

The book is at its most compelling when Cramer provides examples of how rural consciousness pervades discussions of politics. On page 128, for instance, Cramer analyzes a detailed discussion about the Department of Natural Resources and how its regulations about minnow disposal show just how clueless government officials are with the actual lived experiences of the rural folks who live among Wisconsin’s lakes. It is unlikely that any scholar devising a public opinion survey about social identity and group consciousness in Wisconsin would think to ask about minnow disposal, yet Cramer is able to use this discussion to make a convincing argument about the presence and power of rural consciousness.

The book, of course, is not without limitations. As I write this review, the city of Milwaukee is reeling from days of protests following the death of a black man shot by a police officer. According to the U.S. Census, Milwaukee is 40% black. The rural resentment Cramer develops is grounded in the belief that rural people don’t get their fair share relative to urban areas and public sector employees. When her informants discuss this sentiment, they complain about paying for someone else’s “free lunch,” or note that people who use sick days lack a strong work ethic. When asked how they feel about social welfare policies, they say people who look to government for help are lazy. The highway that separates the northern, more rural, part of the state from the southern, more urban, part is referred to as “the Mason Dixon line.” Clearly, racial attitudes are a deep and complex part of identity formation in rural Wisconsin. Rural consciousness undoubtedly involves resentment, but the extent to which it is racial resentment remains unclear. Cramer provides thoughtful discussions of the complexities involved with race relations in Wisconsin, including a discussion of another overlooked group in American politics, namely Native Americans. She explains why she thinks her informants’ views are not just racial in nature (see aforementioned discussion of minnows), but readers will wish there was more. Indeed, I wish she had asked people about race more explicitly and about the state of race relations in Wisconsin. Surveys show that a large portion of whites think that whites are discriminated against. At a minimum, the book would benefit from an exploration of whether that notion resonates with her discussants and the degree to which it might be intertwined with their feelings of being ignored and misunderstood by politicians.

The qualitative scholar in me wants to see and do more research like the work in this book. The positivist in me, however, wants to take many of the insights of this book and figure out how to incorporate them into surveys so that the causal and correlational questions provoked by The Politics of Resentment can be explored. First and foremost, would be to explore the relationship between rural consciousness and racial attitudes. Another important avenue for a positivist approach to rural consciousness would be to examine connections between this identity, partisanship, and affective polarization. Cramer is in the enviable position of being able to implement statewide surveys, and at times used insights from her discussion to craft survey questions and devise measures of rural consciousness (see p. 105). Yet she only uses them for descriptive purposes, leaving their causal and correlational potential untapped. But my frustration at such unanswered questions also speaks to the book’s achievement: setting the stage for a whole new research agenda is an unambiguous mark of a book’s success, and in that regard, Cramer, with The Politics of Resentment, can claim victory.