Affective Polarization and Willingness to Accept the Erosion of Democratic Norms

• In Event: Sources and Consequences of Affective Polarization

Abstract

Affective political polarization occurs when partisans of opposing political parties “increasingly dislike, even loathe, their opponents” (Iyengar et al., 2012, p. 405). The phenomenon has been amply documented in the United States (Iyengar and Westwood 2015; Iyengar et al., 2019; McCoy & Somer, 2019), with co-partisan bias extending well beyond the political realm (Gift & Gift, 2015; Huber & Malhotra, 2017; Iyengar et al., 2012; McConnell et al., 2018). However, affective polarization is not confined to the United States. A study of 22 European democracies concluded that “the ‘fear and loathing’ between the Democrats and the Republicans is nothing outstanding compared to the animosity evident in several European countries” (Reiljan, 2020, p. 387). Similarly, a study of 20 Western polities reports that the United States is not an outlier when it comes to mutual animosity between supporters of the largest left-wing and right-wing parties (Gidron et al., 2019). What is missing in this literature is a systematic study of the consequences of affective polarization. In particular, there is no comparative work on the relationship between effective polarization and acceptance of democratic backsliding.

How can affective polarization shape democratic support? When partisans experience such feelings of antipathy toward an opposing party, they may come to see democratic institutions as vehicles for advancing partisan interests and may be willing to see the rules stretched in order to advantage their party. If a desire for partisan advantage motivates support for democratic backsliding, we would expect followers of the party that controls the executive to be readiest to support the enhancement of executive powers at the expense of checks and balances in order to consolidate their party’s hold on power. This tendency should be especially evident for strong partisans of the incumbent party. Moreover, we would expect those who score highest on affective polarization to be the most accepting of democratic backsliding. Finally, at the aggregate level, we expect to find most support for accepting democratic erosion when overall affective polarization in the entire political system is high.

In this paper, we utilize a new measure of affective polarization developed for a multi-party context to understand how it shapes partisans’ readiness to sacrifice democratic principles. Building on our earlier work studying the relationship between polarization and support for democratic backsliding in the USA and Canada (Gidengil, Stolle & Bergeron-Boutin 2022), we now test the hypothesis in a larger comparative sample including 15 European countries as well as the USA and Canada.

Beyond the 17-country observational study, we also integrate a new experimental design to examine the relationship between affective polarization and acceptance of democratic backsliding. This experiment is conducted in at least one of our cases and manipulates affective polarization by providing information that varies the extent to which people dislike opposing partisans. We use this variation to understand the effect on willingness to accept backsliding. Overall, our paper offers observational and experimental comparative evidence on understanding whether and how affective polarization could foster people's acceptance of the flouting of democratic norms.

Authors

• Dietlind Stolle, McGill

• Elisabeth L. Gidengil

• Olivier Bergeron-Boutin, McGill University