Unaffected polarization? Populism and affective polarization in comparative perspective

Abstract

With both affective polarization and populism on the rise in several countries, many have proposed a link between the two phenomena. Yet, research offers little direct evidence on whether populist individuals are more polarized than their mainstream conunterparts. This paper aims to fill this gap by using data from 37 elections in 31 countries to provide a comparative account of the relationship between populism and affective polarization at the individual level. Contrary to common assumptions, resuts show no significant difference in affective polarization between more and less populist individuals. Instead, we identify a curvilinear relationship wherein both individauls who strongly endorse or reject populist ideas exhibit high levels of polarization, with substantial variations across countries. Furthermore, we find that populism is associated with a general disdain for all political parties rather than just rival parties. These findings challenge the prevailing assumption that populism is asymmetrically associated with affective polarization. We also provide evidence that ideological extremism, rather than populism, is more consistently and strongly associated with affective polarization in a large number of advanced democracies.