Politicians polarize and experts depolarize public support for COVID-19 management policies across countries

Abstract

Political polarization impeded public support for policies to reduce the spread of COVID-19, much as polarization hinders responses to other contemporary challenges. Unlike previous theory and research that focused on the United States, the present research examined the effects of political elite cues and affective polarization on support for policies to manage the COVID-19 pandemic in seven countries (n = 12,955): Brazil, Israel, Italy, South Korea, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Across countries, cues from political elites polarized public attitudes toward COVID-19 policies. Liberal and conservative respondents supported policies proposed by ingroup politicians and parties more than the same policies from outgroup politicians and parties. Respondents disliked, distrusted, and felt cold toward outgroup political elites, whereas they liked, trusted, and felt warm toward both ingroup political elites and nonpartisan experts. This affective polarization was correlated with policy support. These findings imply that policies from bipartisan coalitions and nonpartisan experts would be less polarizing, enjoying broader public support. Indeed, across countries, policies from bipartisan coalitions and experts were more widely supported. A follow-up experiment replicated these findings among US respondents considering international vaccine distribution policies. The polarizing effects of partisan elites and affective polarization emerged across nations that vary in cultures, ideologies, and political systems. Contrary to some propositions, the United States was not exceptionally polarized. Rather, these results suggest that polarizing processes emerged simply from categorizing people into political ingroups and outgroups. Political elites drive polarization globally, but nonpartisan experts can help resolve the conflicts that arise from it.

Social norms explain prioritization of climate policy

“…Prior research shows that people both assimilate to their ingroups and differentiate from outgroups (Berger and Heath 2008 ; Chan et al 2012 ; Ehret et al 2018 ; Iyengar et al 1999 ; Mummendey and Wenzel 1999 ). Negative reactions to outgroups might be especially influential in highly polarized contexts such as climate policy in the United States, where Democrats and Republicans actively distrust and dislike each other (Druckman et al 2021 ; Finkel et al 2020 ; Flores et al 2022 ; Iyengar et al 2019 ; Iyengar and Westwood, 2015; Skitka 2010 ). However, our findings demonstrate that people’s prioritization of climate policy is more positively influenced by ingroup norms than it is negatively influenced by outgroup norms, extending previous work about partisan norms in the context of climate policy (Ehret et al 2018 ; Van Boven et al 2018 ).…”

Trust in COVID-19 policy among public health professionals in Israel during the first wave of the pandemic: a cross-sectional study

“…The success of public health interventions during the pandemic depends on public trust in experts and on public belief that these experts are involved in the decision making processes for policy development [ 22 ]. In order to increase public support on health policy it is critical that the policy is proposed by experts in the relevant field [ 33 , 38 ]. Therefore, it is critical to involve professionals from relevant fields in the decision-making process [ 22 , 23 ] during pandemics and other types of emergencies.…”

Global pandemics, conflict and networks – the dynamics of international instability, infodemics and health care in the 21st century

“…It can be quickly undermined when those institutions are perceived to be failing (Mechanic, 1996). As indicated in the foregoing narrative, these issues are exacerbated and fuelled by a polarising networked infodemic, linked to political contestation of expertise (Devine et al, 2020) that suggests the public good should not be the dominant health response paradigm but trumped by the rights of individuals to opt out of such responses because they mistrust or reject the underlying science of public health (see Rothschild, 2021 and Flores et al, 2022). The result, as COVID-19 has shown, is significant minorities of the population refusing to engage with protective measures (Helm, 2020).…”