It's an interesting paper, but unfortunately it misses the point.<p>Polar dissimilar political beliefs are not the problem. Many countries have this, and even have lively political discussions that remain civil, rallies that remain civil, and elections that remain civil.<p>The actual problem is psychological, specifically dealing with identity beliefs. Once a person takes on a belief as part of their identity, any attack upon that belief becomes an attack upon the person, at which point they will retaliate for the offence or dig in to defend. This is most commonly observed in the "Backfire Effect".<p>Identity beliefs are pervasive in the USA, so much so that I doubt many are aware of it (the authors of this paper certainly aren't). For example, in America you say "I'm a Republican." but in Germany you say "I support the CDU." Notice the difference? One is an identity, the other is an action. Guess in which of these countries you can have polite (even if heated) dinner conversations about politics!<p>Identity beliefs aren't limited to politics, either. They can be religious, ethnic, or even ideological (e.g. incels, preppers, anti-vaxers, jihadists, etc).
The media calling January 6th an 'insurrection' is a perfect example of the problem.<p>It's pure sensationalism.<p>There were no guns, there was no centralized organization to indicate an insurrection, the 4 people who died were all protestors, mostly from being dumbasses.<p>Clearly those people who damaged the capitol should be punished, just like the Black Lives Matter protesters who damaged the Foley Federal Building.<p>But calling it an INSURRECTION is just pure disingenuous sensationalism by the media.<p>What story will make the media more money:<p>A protest that got very heated?
Or an insurrection?<p>And of course the more extreme opponents of either side will seize on the identity politics and propagate this narrative and we continue down the path of polarization.<p>I have no idea how to fix this issue of media propaganda other than teaching people statistics and critical thinking, but that starts with education from an early age. I don't know if most people even have the time to research alternative views so they just trust their news sources, which worked up until the past decade(?) or so.
Fascinating paper. And nice job with the model!<p>> Strictly limiting exposure to dissimilar views, however, is an effective mechanism for avoiding rapid polarization (Figs. 4 and 5). This may, at first, appear contrary to practical experience: Encouraging interactions among those with different views might be expected to decrease polarization by fostering increased tolerance.<p>Lots of interesting points in there.
The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum.<p>The easy way to avoid people from accidentally getting too far outside of the spectrum is to dial up the "liveliness" of the debate and double down wedge issues.<p>It's staggeringly effective and quite depressing to watch. It's quite one thing watching strangers explode in response to divisive propaganda designed to drive a wedge between them and people with fundamentally similar interests.<p>It's quite another to watch your own friends and family be manipulated this way.
My country Bulgaria just had elections. The new government is a mix parties with completely different ideologies, one of them is considered very corrupt, another is considered populist. The thing is that the previous government was turning into one man dictatorship, and none of the other parties on their own could win. Some of the new parties seem to be competent. In any case it would be interesting to see if such model could work. Certainly it will be fragile, and the looming crisis will not help either.
Polarization in America: One side invaded the capital building in a violent attempt to overthrow democracy, and the other side wants to make voting for whoever you want as easy as possible.<p>Guess which pole I’m at and tell me how I should meet the other pole in the middle.
Both ideological and effective polarization are exacerbated by electoral and political structures like those in the US that promote factional duopoly; comparative study of modern democracies has shown this. Reducing it is simple, adopt an electoral system which has greater legislative proportionality and a political system less heavily tilted to a unitary executive.
I don't think you can, if the fundamental premises and values of different groups of people are too divergent.
I've been noticing the greatest hates comes from actually knowing your neighbor rather than the myth hate comes from being ignorant.<p>If I had to guess its knowing plus disgust leads to polarization.
The polarization is much worse on the left side of the isle. I’d always observed it on the internet with what comes across as belligerent hate of anything done by a conservative, but this recent poll really brings home just how far the brainwashing has gone.<p><a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/over-70-of-young-democrats-wouldnt-date-republicans-poll" rel="nofollow">https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/over-70-of-young...</a><p>If your political beliefs prevent you from associating with somebody because you have labeled them so firmly as to write them off entirely as a person, you have jumped the shark and become the problem.
Bad political science + virtuoso use of methodology but unsubstantiated + underlying US centrism<p>Polarization is a problem when you let a political system polarize. In other words, while in Europe multiple parties represented in parliament are the norm; in the US - a two-party state, naturally exacerbate the risk of polarization.<p>So, paradoxically, polarization is a problem of not enough variety in the political spectrum. Not too much difference.<p>Looking from abroad, democrats and republicans are <i>almost</i> the same. And this is the core of the problem, and the deeper root of polarization.
The problem is not polarization of ideas, the problem is the lack of freedom and the imposition of the ideas over the others.<p>I love that you think that a big ass state is the best for everybody, I don't think so, so don't forefully make me pay a lot of taxes for a lot of services I don't want and I can't decide. Group yourself with people happy with that and let the others live their life without imposing them that shit.
I think polarisation within the voters is not necessarily a bad thing, you need to stick to your ideas, and somehow if someone is for wealth redistribution and public infrastructure and someone considers that taxation is theft it's hardly a situation that can be mixed within the people, or if someone wants to lock immigrants in a cage and someone wants open border it's hardly matchable. but I think this is where the power of the democratic process comes to mind, if you have people actually voting according to their ideas, the representation that those ideas would make sure that within parliament there is a balance of those point of view, so like, maybe let's not completely open the border, but make it dependent on immigrant background, or let's decrease taxes and public spending by cutting some money waste, etc. Voters I think must be polarised, it is the parliament who needs to create a balance through discussion.<p>I mean I am not sure if I am polarised but sticking to the example I am not sure what my point of rendez-vous would be with a guy who considers taxation as theft for example
I am in the process of reading all of these comments, so I know I have a ways to go.<p>If we are in fact talking about strange beluefs becoming a matter of identity, then any attempt to talk someone out of that identity will not help anyone.<p>It's certainly important to acknowledge our own beliefs, and to check those beliefs against the facts on the ground. You can sure start to feel like you are surrounded by crazy people, and get pulled into arguing "the facts" anyway. That's how I usually screw it up.<p>So what happens if, instead of pushing back on facts, when someone in personal conversation insists that (for example) the current president was illegitimately elected... what happens with a responsing by questions that signal my interest in their point of view?<p>"Ok, what is the most important thing for Americans to do right now?"<p>Usually people will think I am agreeing with them. I might have to assert my point of view, I don't want to lie to people.<p>I don't know if anything will work, at this point.
I think one way to massively reduce polarization in the US at least is to mix up the parties. That is to say, get left leaning people into the republican party and right leaning people into the democratic party. (just having them vote in the primaries would be sufficient). This would at least dampen the political effect of extreme polarization.<p>The funny thing is that from a game theory perspective, it seems like it would be in both parties’ interest to encourage this. If you push your supporters into the opposing party for the primary but they don’t follow suit, your voter base/platform can remain static but your opponent’s voter base/platform shifts towards you. This would make it easier to pass legislation you want.<p>Allow this to continue and eventually both parties would have to encourage this until we reach nash equilibrium with both parties being fairly heterogeneous.
What if the polarization is the result of the economic system becoming bankrupt and that large structural changes are actually necessary? There's a baked in idea here that compromise and centrism is always right, when it may be that during periods of history when centrism is the wrong path that political polarization naturally increases. By trying to avoid deeper structural change it becomes like pressure building up on a fault line and the longer it goes on the worse the resulting political Earthquake becomes.
>Democracies require compromise. But compromise becomes almost impossible when voters are divided into diametrically opposed camps.<p>One of the identity tricks that George W Bush used was being a yokel. The Democrats fell into the obvious trap of attacking his identity which immediately turned off tons of people. Then Bush kept going with identity politics. Like: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_liberal" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_liberal</a><p>So then right after that, the democrats played the ultimate identity politics card with Obama. First black president! This is in context of Kanye West saying George W Bush doesn't care about black people during a hurricane for new orleans. Black identity was played hard.<p>The thing about identity politics is that it's not free. Bush's identity politics enabled and pushed the identity politics of Obama which created and enabled Trump. You'll notice that biden vs trump is old white dudes.<p>But more importantly, BLM for example seems like they are allied with Biden/Harris but who has so far done more for the black community? Trump. Biden and friends have passed and done nothing for BLM. Clinton described Trump’s supporters: “You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic—you name it.<p>You might ask, when does it end? It really doesn't until something pretty big breaks it. Civil war? War with China? War with Canada? It will be something very bloody to stop this and reunite people.
We are past the point when preventing polarization was possible. Now we are near the end of the path one political side brought us, with the other fighting against that.<p>One side will win and will establish the rules the society will follow for the next decades.