Dynamics of Political Polarization

Abstract

This article accounts for two puzzling paradoxes. The first paradox is the simultaneous absence and presence of attitude polarization, the fact that global attitude polarization is relatively rare, even though pundits describe it as common. The second paradox is the simultaneous presence and absence of social polarization, the fact that while individuals experienced attitude homogeneity in their interpersonal networks, their networks are characterized by attitude heterogeneity. These paradoxes give rise to numerous scholarly arguments. By deploying a formal model of interpersonal influence over attitudes in a context where individuals hold simultaneous positions on multiple issues we show why these arguments are not mutually exclusive and how they meaningfully refer to the same social setting. It follows that the results from this model provide a single parsimonious account for both paradoxes. The framework we develop may be generalized to a wider array of problems, including classic problems in collective action.

The Diverging Beliefs and Practices of the Religiously Affiliated and Unaffiliated in the United States

“…The increasing homogeneity of these networks could be driven both by the growth of the unaffiliated and homophily of characteristics related to nonaffiliation, such as occupation, age, and education. Such network homogeneity can potentially drive group polarization and changing values and beliefs (Myers and Lamm 1976;Baldassarri and Bearman 2007). Second, the growth of the unaffiliated has provided an opportunity to create collective organizations and movements around secular points of view.…”

Important Matters in Political Context

“…People only talk about contentious issues with people they feel safe sharing their opinion with (Gamson, Fireman, and Rytina 1982). By the fall of 2004, the political polarization we now take for granted in the United States had largely solidified (Abramowitz and Saunders 2008;Fiorina and Abrams 2008) 2 , with network effects that encouraged homophilious group formation to avoid partisan dissonance (Baldassarri and Bearman 2007;Sprague 1987, 1988). To a great extent, Americans are now sorted along partisan lines and discuss politics with like-minded people.…”

“…In highly polarized environments, where individual networks are segregated, network homophily is high and so people discuss whatever topics they discussincluding political matters-with like-minded people (Baldassarri and Bearman 2007). In such contexts, people are aware that they agree with one another.…”

“…7 Following Baldassarri and Bearman (2007)'s strategy, we compute the kurtosis-which captures the bimodality of distribution-as kurtosis j = ∑ N i=1 (p i −µ j ) 4 Nσ 4 j − 3, where p i is an individual i's political ideology score, µ j and σ j are the mean and the standard deviation of political ideology in the neighborhood j, and N is the number of individuals in neighborhood j.…”

Exit, cohesion, and consensus: social psychological moderators of consensus among adolescent peer groups

“…Virtually all social diffusion work -ranging from models of the spread of information or behaviors through a connected population (Christakis and Fowler 2007;Coleman, Katz, and Menzel 1966;Kreager and Haynie 2011) to theories of collective behavior (Baldassarri and Bearman 2007;Granovetter 1978;Moody 2001) -builds on a common formal basis: a model of interpersonal influence where people adjust their opinions or behaviors towards the weighted average of the opinions or behaviors of their peers (Friedkin 1998;Friedkin and Johnsen 2011). This formal basis is highly flexible.…”