Political scientists at the University of South Florida find that voters in both parties tend to agree on common-sense reforms on gun control, education and even abortion. And yet, these voters are more polarized than ever.
What does it mean for an electorate to be “polarized”? Typically, when we talk about polarization, most casual observers think of intractable differences in opinion among those on varied ends of the political spectrum. But that phenomenon has never truly defined the American electorate. In fact, polling data consistently shows that the plurality of American voters share a general consensus when it comes to common-sense reforms across a host of policy issues, including gun policy, education, border security and even abortion.
Nonetheless, we find ourselves adrift in an increasingly toxic and ineffectual political climate. How do we explain this contradiction? Well for starters, we need a better definition. When political scientists discuss polarization, we actually make a crucial distinction between what we call “issue polarization” (those differences of opinion about what government should do) and “affective polarization” (or the emotionally constructed opinions that Democrats and Republicans hold of one another).
It’s the latter which has come to define America’s increasingly corrosive political climate. Despite the fact that most Americans continue to support moderate and common-sense policy reforms, Democrats and Republicans increasingly view one another in negative (even vitriolic) terms. We can talk about the reasons for this contradiction, but first let’s look at the numbers.
In a recent survey conducted at the University of South Florida, we asked 1,500 registered voters a series of questions about how they view both Democrats and Republicans. Consistent with data collected by the Pew Research Center, we found an alarming tendency toward high affective polarization.
This tendency is consistent across both parties, with 76% of Democrats expressing an unfavorable view of the Republican Party, and 82% of Republicans expressing similar sentiments about the Democratic Party.
Moreover, neither Democrats nor Republicans trust the other’s leaders. A large majority of both Democratic respondents (74%) and Republican respondents (80%) expressed distrust in the opposing party’s leaders to act in the best interest of the American people.
But that’s not what we find most disconcerting. Historically, Democrats and Republicans have held negative views of political elites and institutional leaders in the opposing party. But we took our questions a step further and asked them their opinions about voters in each party as well — in other words, those everyday citizens who simply hold different political views.
The most common words that Democrats selected to describe Republican voters were “hypocritical” (83%), “selfish” (80%), “mean” (77%) and “hard-working” (50%). In turn, Republican respondents described Democratic voters in similar fashion, with the most commonly selected adjectives being “hypocritical” (79%), “selfish” (74%), “lazy” (61%), and “mean” (61%).
Overall, Democrats were a bit more generous in their assessment of Republicans, although their opinions were decidedly negative overall. About half of Democrats chose to describe Republicans as “hard-working” (50%) and “patriotic” (49%). In contrast, Republican voters chose across-the-board negative characteristics to describe Democratic voters. Only a little over a third of Republicans chose to describe Democratic voters in positive terms like “intelligent” (37%) and “generous” (37%).
The factors underlying this increasingly negative trend are varied and diverse, and political scientists offer more than a few explanations for why Democrats and Republicans may view one another in such divisive and counterproductive terms. But two factors in particular are impossible to ignore: First, the increasingly hostile rhetoric of political elites and, second, the growing role of social media in political discourse.
With limited time at their disposal to follow and process political information, voters tend to take cues from leaders within their own party, and those leaders (i.e. candidates and elected officials) have grown increasingly hostile in recent years.
Undoubtedly, a shift toward primary elections and gerrymandered congressional districts have played a role in this trend. For a growing number of aspiring politicians, winning now means appealing first and foremost to the most extreme interests within their own party base. And when districts are drawn to favor one party over another, the candidate’s ability to “pivot” back toward a more centrist position becomes less important than maintaining the favor of that more active and extreme party base. As a result, political rhetoric increasingly frames societal challenges in terms of “us against them.”
These echo chambers that we see in gerrymandered districts are only amplified by our increasing reliance on social media for political news and information. While the anonymity of social media facilitates hostile political discourse, its functionality allows voters to insulate themselves from alternative viewpoints and corrective information, undermining the broader societal goals of empathy and shared understanding.
Certainly, there’s more to it than this, but it’s difficult to imagine a return to political civility under operating conditions such as these, which so overtly favor hostility and affective polarization. As this polarization continues to divide American voters, communities and even families, changing these conditions may prove to be the most significant political challenge of our times.
Megan Corn is a graduate assistant and researcher in Tampa’s University of South Florida School of Public Affairs. Stephen Neely is an associate professor in USF’s School of Public Affairs, as well as a faculty senior fellow with the Global and National Security Institute at USF.
