Is political polarization worse than it's been in the past?

Polarization is rising on several measures — I'll gather the latest research and historical trends to put it in context.

It depends on timeframe and how you measure it - but by most modern measures, yes, worse than the last 50-80 years, no, not worse than the most divided periods of American history.

1. By modern measures, polarization is at a 50+ year high

Scholars distinguish between ideological polarization - differences in policy positions - and affective polarization - dislike and distrust of political out-groups - both apparent in the United States.

In Congress:

A Pew Research Center analysis finds that, on average, Democrats and Republicans are farther apart ideologically today than at any time in the past 50 years.

The analysis is based on DW-NOMINATE, a method that uses lawmakers' roll-call votes to place them in a two-dimensional ideological space. DW-NOMINATE uses every roll-call vote in congressional history to place every member on a scale from roughly -1 (most liberal) to +1 (most conservative).

Studies tracing DW-NOMINATE show a U-shape: a bitterly split Gilded Age, a mid-century convergence that bottomed out in 1947, and a steep climb since the 1970s that passed the old 1895 record in 2011.

Polarization among U.S. legislators is asymmetric, as it has primarily been driven by a rightward shift among Republicans in Congress, though a 2026 Cambridge Political Psychology Lab study tracking opinion since 1988 found a different pattern among the public: the US left was 31.5% more socially liberal in 2024 compared to 1988, while the US right was only 2.8% more conservative.

Among the public (affective polarization):

According to the Pew Research Center, members of both parties who have unfavorable opinions of the opposing party doubled between 1994 and 2014.

More recent Pew data show how far this has gone: in 1994, only 17% of Republicans and 16% of Democrats held a very unfavorable view of the other party. By 2022, those figures had risen to 62% and 54%, respectively.

Divisions within the US population on social and political issues have increased by 64% since 1988, with almost all this coming after 2008, according to a study tracking polarisation from the end of the Reagan era to the dawn of Trump’s second term. The University of Cambridge’s Political Psychology Lab analysed opinions on a wide range of issues and found polarisation almost flatlined during the nineties and noughties, before rising steadily starting in 2008.

In the late 20th and early 21st century, the U.S. has experienced a greater surge in ideological polarization and affective polarization than comparable democracies.

2. By longer historical measures, not the worst ever

Historians consistently point to two periods as more polarized:

The 1850s-1860s - Civil War Era:

It has become common to say the United States is more divided today than at any other point, but as a historian who has written and taught about the Civil War era for several decades, current divisions pale in comparison to those of the mid-19th century.

Four years of civil war produced at least 620,000 military deaths – the equivalent of approximately 6.5 million dead in the United States of 2020. No political issue today approaches slavery in terms of divisiveness, and political violence included the caning of a senator on the Senate floor.

The Gilded Age (c.1870-1900):

The Gilded Age of the late 19th century is considered to be one of the most politically polarized periods in American history, with open political violence and highly polarized political discourse.

One USC analysis noted that following a period of a much more balanced Congress during the middle of the 20th century, ideological distance between the parties began to grow during the 1970s to the extent that Congress is now more polarized than at any time since the late 1870s Reconstruction Era - meaning today is the most polarized since Reconstruction, but not more polarized than the late 19th century peak.

The 1950s and 1960s were marked by high levels of political bipartisanship, the results of a post-World War II "consensus", so the current era appears especially divided compared to living memory, but that mid-century period was historically unusual for its low polarization.

3. Why the perception of "worse than ever" persists

In short: If you mean compared to the last 50-70 years, yes - by votes in Congress, negative feelings toward the other party, and public sorting on issues, polarization is measurably worse and has surged since the 1970s, and especially since 2008. If you mean compared to all of American history, no - the fractures over slavery and the Civil War, and the partisan battles of the Gilded Age, were substantially more severe and violent.