Wedge issue

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Wedge issue is a social or political issue, often of a divisive or otherwise controversial nature, which is used by one political group to split apart or create a "wedge" in the support base of an opposing political group, with a view to enticing voters to give their support to the first group. The use of wedge issues gives rise to wedge politics.

Politicial parties are usually fairly diverse groups, though they will always try to project a united front. A wedge issue may often be a point of internal dissent within the opposing party, which that party tries to supress or ignore talking about because it devides "the base." Such issues are typically a cultural or populist issue, relating to matters such as crime, national security, sexuality (e.g. gay marriage), or race. Another party may exploit this dissent by publicly supporting the issue, and in effect align itself with the dissenting faction of the opposing party. A wedge issue is intended to bring about such things as:

• A debate, often vitriolic, within the opposing party, giving the public a perception of disarray.
• The defection of supporters of the opposing party's minority faction to the other party, should they lose the debate.
• The legitimising of sentiment which, while perhaps popularly held, is usually considered inappropriate or politically incorrect; criticisms from the opposition then make it appear beholden to special interests or fringe ideology.

To prevent these three consequences from occurring, the opposing party may attempt to take a "pragmatic" stand and officially endorse the views of its minority faction. However, this can lead to the defection of supporters of the opposing party's majority faction to a third party, should they lose the debate.

Wedge politics in the United States

The Republican Party, especially in recent times has been accused of using social issues as wedge issues to divide the Democratic voting base. For example, some Republican strategists hoped that African Americans, a traditionally liberal voting bloc yet also one that posesses some of the most conservative views on matters of homosexuality, may be more inclinded to vote for the Republican Party because of their opposition to the gay marriage issue.

Wedge politics in Australia

In Australia "wedge politics" may sometimes be known as dog whistle politics, due to the practice of selective targeting so that only certain people will hear the message being pitched.

The Tampa incident

A case study of the use of wedge issues in practice comes from the 2001 federal election campaign in Australia. In early and mid-2001, a great deal of public attention was focused on boat people (asylum seekers arriving on unauthorised vessels), there having been several widely publicised landings of hundreds of people. On August 24 2001, a ship illegally bearing 460 such people became distressed, and its passengers were picked up by the Norwegian cargo vessel MV Tampa.

The governing Liberal Party of Australia took the opportunity to appear tough on asylum seekers. The opposition Australian Labor Party (ALP) had a slight majority of people strongly favouring more sympathetic treatment, and was hence perceived as interally split. This provoked a fierce debate within the ALP on the relative merits of siding with national opinion (in favour of the Government's actions) or standing on party principle (opposing). But with over 90% of some television polls supporting the government's stance, the leader of the ALP Kim Beazley chose to silence the majority and agree to the tougher policy - though it ended up opposing certain elements of proposed legislation, which the Liberal Party blasted as "weak on border security".

The damage was done, with the party appearing inconsistent and divided. The Liberal Party campaigned largely on a platform of border security, and increased its support at the federal election that November, despite being the incumbent. Some who would typically vote Labor voted instead for the Greens and the Democrats in protest against what they saw as the ALP's complicity.sv:Knäckfråga