ABSTRACT
In an effort to sort out the contradictory patterns and differing interpretations of the evidence on national realignment, many analysts have focused on regional evidence, especially evidence from the South, which some consider critical to the formation of a new Republican majority. Understanding the causes and conditions of the Mountain West realignment can reveal much about the prospects for a national realignment. V. O. Key viewed secular realignment as a series of processes that "operate inexorably, and almost imperceptibly, election after election," to change the agenda of politics and the coalitions formed around that agenda. With the landslide election and reelection of President Ronald Reagan, political analysts are once again discussing the possibility of a major electoral realignment, a realignment that would establish the Republicans as the national majority party. Perhaps the most refined of the concepts of realignment is James Sunquist's two stage theory. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
