Noam Gidron

There is a broad consensus that the ideological space of Western democracies consists of two distinct dimensions: one economic and the other cultural. In this Element, the authors explore how ordinary citizens make sense of these two dimensions. Analyzing novel survey data collected across ten Western democracies, they employ text analysis techniques to investigate responses to open-ended questions. They examine variations in how people interpret these two ideological dimensions along three levels of analysis: across countries, based on demographic features, and along the left-right divide. Their results suggest that there are multiple two-dimensional spaces: that is, different groups ascribe different meanings to what the economic and cultural political divides stand for. They also find that the two dimensions are closely intertwined in people's minds. Their findings make theoretical contributions to the study of electoral politics and political ideology.

There is a broad consensus that the ideological space of Western democracies consists of two distinct dimensions: one economic and the other cultural. In this Element, the authors explore how ordinary citizens make sense of these two dimensions. Analyzing novel survey data collected across ten Western democracies, they employ text analysis techniques to investigate responses to open-ended questions. They examine variations in how people interpret these two ideological dimensions along three levels of analysis: across countries, based on demographic features, and along the left-right divide. Their results suggest that there are multiple two-dimensional spaces: that is, different groups ascribe different meanings to what the economic and cultural political divides stand for. They also find that the two dimensions are closely intertwined in people's minds. Their findings make theoretical contributions to the study of electoral politics and political ideology.

American political observers express increasing concern about affective polarization, i.e., partisans' resentment toward political opponents. We advance debates about America's partisan divisions by comparing affective polarization in the US over the past 25 years with affective polarization in 19 other western publics. We conclude that American affective polarization is not extreme in comparative perspective, although Americans' dislike of partisan opponents has increased more rapidly since the mid-1990s than in most other Western publics. We then show that affective polarization is more intense when unemployment and inequality are high; when political elites clash over cultural issues such as immigration and national identity; and in countries with majoritarian electoral institutions. Our findings situate American partisan resentment and hostility in comparative perspective, and illuminate correlates of affective polarization that are difficult to detect when examining the American case in isolation.