Article Summary
Introduction
There are concerns about high levels of affective polarization in the US. However, little is known about how partisan animosities in the US compare to other Western societies. Putting partisan affect into perspective can reveal whether partisan animosities are indeed more prevalent in the US or whether affective polarization is a more general phenomenon in advanced democratic societies. The authors set out to study affective polarization in the US from a comparative perspective, asking two principal questions: How does the level of partisan animosities in the US compare to other Western democracies? And what institutional and economic factors are related to varying levels of affective polarization in Western democracies?
Analytical Approach
The authors rely on several survey waves of the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES) project collected in the United States and nineteen other Western Democracies. In the survey, respondents were asked to what extent they (dis)like the principal parties in their country. As most Western democracies feature more than two political parties, such as in the US, the authors rely on a weighted affective polarization measure. This measure takes into account the size of the party in each democracy, where dislike of larger parties weighs more in individuals’ affective polarization score than dislike of smaller parties.
The analysis proceeds in two steps. First, the authors compare the aggregated affective polarization scores between the US and other Western countries. Second, the authors investigate the association between a set of country variables (e.g., elite polarization, economic inequality, unemployment, and electoral institutions) and countries’ levels of affective polarization.
Main Findings
The authors report that the overall level of affective polarization is not an outlier among Western democracies. However, Americans tend to be more hostile toward the out-party and feel less positive about their own party than most other Western democracies.
As for the correlates of affective polarization, elite polarization on cultural issues, such as immigration, race, and national identity, is positively associated with partisan animosities in Western societies. Furthermore, greater income inequality is correlated with higher levels of partisan animosities. Lastly, democracies with majoritarian electoral institutions tend to exhibit a higher level of hostile feelings toward out-parties and less positive feelings toward the in-party.
Implications
A key implication of the study is that the overall level of affective polarization in the US is comparable to other Western democracies. While pundits often raise concerns over partisan animosities in the US, affective polarization is a common phenomenon among advanced democracies and not only in the US. However, a key difference between the US and other Western democracies is the relatively strong negative feeling toward the other party and relatively weak positive feelings for the own party. This notable difference suggests that, perhaps surprisingly, Americans’ partisan identity is less defined by their warm feelings toward their own party but mainly by their negative affect toward the other party.
Questions left unanswered
The authors raise two questions left unanswered by their empirical study. First, while the study did not find notable differences in the overall level of affective polarization between the US and other Western democracies, Americans might differ from other electorates in terms of policy preferences. For instance, do Americans hold more extreme policy views of the economy or cultural issues?
Second, the sorting of liberals into the Democratic and conservatives into the Republican party in the US raises the question of whether similar developments have unfolded in other Western democracies. Have supporters of political parties in other Western democracies also become more similar in terms of their ideological preferences, socioeconomic backgrounds, or race? Or, despite similar levels of affective polarization, are party supporters in Western publics more diverse with respect to their social identities?
Methods and Analysis
Was the study and its analyses pre-registered?: Yes
Did the study rely on proxy variables to measure polarization?: Yes
The authors use the following survey item to measure affective polarization: “I’d like to know what you think about each of our political parties. After I read the name of a political party, please rate it on a scale from 0 to 10, where 0 means you strongly dislike that party and 10 means that you strongly like that party.”
Were standard p-value thresholds used (p<.05 or 95% Confidence Intervals that don’t overlap zero)?: Yes
- Largest p-value presented as significant: 0.05
Were correlational results interpreted with causal language?: No
Limitations / Weaknesses
The authors transparently acknowledge that their sample size is small. Overall, due to survey data constraints, the analysis builds on only eighty country-year observations in twenty Western democracies. Consequently, when examining the relationship between country covariates and affective polarization, the analysis can only draw on variation in elite polarization, economic variables, and institutional factors from a limited number of cases. Furthermore, these variables are relatively constant within each country, which is why only broader descriptive patterns between democracies can be studied.
Open Data & Analyses
Does the article make the replication data publicly available?: No
Does the article make the replication analysis scripts publicly available?: No
Article Citation
Gidron, N., Adams, J., & Horne, W. (2020). American affective polarization in comparative perspective. Cambridge University Press.
Bibtex
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@book{gidron2020,
title = {American Affective Polarization in Comparative Perspective},
author = {Gidron, Noam and Adams, James and Horne, Will},
year = {2020},
series = {Cambridge Elements. Elements in American Politics},
publisher = {Cambridge University Press},
location = {Cambridge, United Kingdom; New York, NY, USA}
}