Polarization (politics)

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In politics, polarization is the process by which the public opinion divides and goes to the extremes. It can also refer to when the extreme factions of a political party gain dominance in a party. In either case moderate voices often find that they have lost power.

In recent times, some Americans, such as American Demographics magazine editor John McManus, have seen increasing polarization in the U.S. political system. Some point to Jim Jeffords' resignation from the Republican Party in 2001 because of his feelings that the party was becoming increasingly polarized and that moderate voices were getting shut out. President Bill Clinton said on the 9/18/06 Daily Show that he thinks the current republican party believes in polarization.

Others, such as Constitution Party analyst Michael Peroutka, take the view that the U.S. political parties themselves are actually quite close in terms of actual policy and party leadership. They say that political rhetoric is polarized in order to create some illusion of policy difference; however, in practice and action, both parties take a similar approach to government. Examples include vast bipartisan and popular support for one side of various supposedly controversial issues; a majority of both major parties in Congress voted to cut taxes in 2001, to authorize use of force in Iraq in 2002, and to ban partial-birth abortion in 2003. Additionally, since 1948, the Congress and the President--whether Democratic or Republican--have shown the same willingness to grow the size of the Federal Government. Supporters of this theory also say that public opinion has not gone to the extreme; rather, both parties have come closer to the center. Thus, for the average "centrist" voter, it is easier to decide which party/candidate is closest to them.

Mr. Peroutka's is a minority opinion^{[citation needed]}; most Americans and most in the news media see a very real rift growing within the fabric of U.S. society, as was shown most dramatically through the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, when the vote was virtually half and half between the two sides. However, it may be argued that those election results merely confirm that both major parties are essentially equivalent and as such attract a nearly equal number of votes.

Perhaps the most disturbing sign of the schism has been the ominous division of the country into rigid geographic blocs, a phenomenon that has not been seen in America since the days leading up the Civil War in the 1852, 1856, and 1860 presidential elections.

An example of polarization is in Germany in the early years after the first world war, when there was support for political parties on the extreme left such as the spartacists, and also the extreme right, such as the National Socialist Party.