Analysis of the political ideology of American professors over time using the Stanford DIME donor data.
| Year | n | Left % | Right % |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | 4,423 | 80% | 20% |
| 2004 | 18,001 | 89% | 11% |
| 2008 | 37,239 | 89% | 11% |
| 2012 | 52,380 | 92% | 8% |
| 2016 | 62,491 | 94% | 6% |
| 2020 | 149,497 | 95% | 5% |
| 2024 | 71,188 | 93% | 7% |
The Database on Ideology, Money in Politics, and Elections (DIME) is a comprehensive dataset maintained by Stanford University that contains records of over 130 million political contributions made by individuals and organizations to federal and state election campaigns in the United States from 1979 to the present.
DIME was created by Adam Bonica at Stanford University. The database links campaign finance records with estimated ideological positions for both donors and recipients.
Data source: https://data.stanford.edu/dime
Political ideology is measured using CFscores (Campaign Finance Scores), developed by Bonica (2014). CFscores are estimated using a scaling method applied to campaign contribution data:
- Donors who give to similar candidates are estimated to have similar ideologies
- The resulting scores place donors and candidates on a common ideological scale
- Negative values indicate left-leaning (liberal/Democratic)
- Positive values indicate right-leaning (conservative/Republican)
- Scores typically range from approximately -2 to +2
CFscores have been validated against other measures of ideology (e.g., DW-NOMINATE scores for legislators) and are widely used in political science research.
Professors are identified by keyword matching on the self-reported occupation field in campaign finance records. The following keywords are used (case-insensitive):
- professor
- academia
- academic
- faculty
- lecturer
- university teacher
The analysis includes individual donors (not organizations) who:
- Have an occupation matching the professor keywords
- Made at least one contribution in the given election cycle
- Have a valid CFscore
Each data point represents a unique donor-cycle observation. A professor who donates in multiple cycles appears once per cycle.
- Bonica, Adam. 2014. "Mapping the Ideological Marketplace." American Journal of Political Science 58(2): 367-386.
- Bonica, Adam. 2016. "Database on Ideology, Money in Politics, and Elections." Stanford University Libraries. https://data.stanford.edu/dime
# Requires DIME contributor data file (dime_contributors_1979_2024.csv.gz)
python professors_distribution_video.pyoutput/professors_ideology_animation.gif- Animated visualizationoutput/professors_smoothed_histogram_YYYY.png- Individual year plots
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