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

Polarization today feels worse than ever — I'll compare current data to history to see if it actually is.

It is, and it isn't - it depends on the timeframe you use.

1. Compared to the last 50 years: Yes, it is worse than ever

By most modern quantitative measures, U.S. polarization is at a recent historic high:

> The overall share of Americans who express consistently conservative or consistently liberal opinions has doubled over the past two decades from 10% to 21%

> In the 117th U.S. Congress from 2021 to 2023, there were about two dozen moderate Democrats and Republicans... For comparison, there were more than 160 moderates five decades earlier during the 92nd U.S. Congress from 1971-1972

> Both parties have grown more ideologically cohesive. There are now only about two dozen moderate Democrats and Republicans left on Capitol Hill, versus more than 160 in 1971-72

Affective polarization - disliking the other side - has also risen sharply

Researchers measure affective polarization as negative feelings toward members of opposing parties relative to one's own, on a 0-100 "feeling thermometer" scale.

> over time, affective polarization — the extent of negative feelings toward those in the other party — has increased more in the US than in any of the other countries

A Brown/Stanford study found:

> They found that in the U.S., affective polarization has increased more dramatically since the late 1970s than in the eight other countries they examined—the U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, Switzerland, Norway and Sweden

Specifically:

> In 1978, the average American rated the members of their own political party 27 points higher than members of the other major party. By 2016, Americans were rating their own party 45.9 points higher than the other party, on average

Another study tracking polarization from the end of the Reagan era found:

> Divisions within the US population on social and political issues have increased by 64% since 1988, with almost all this coming after 2008

The Pew Charitable Trusts notes in 2026 that 69% of Americans are dissatisfied with how things are going, during a time of increased political polarization.

2. Compared to all of U.S. history: No, it was worse before

Historians almost universally point to the period around the Civil War as more polarized:

> I can think of at least one time polarization was way worse than it is now — between 1861 and 1865, when the Civil War was going on

> "The most divisive time in our history was in the years leading up to the Civil War

Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin has said:

> I think they're worse than they were in the 1960s. They're certainly not worse than they were in the 1850s when we were on the verge of a civil war

Data on congressional elites supports that framing:

> Because the NOMINATE data generated by James Lo and his co-authors shows that partisan elites in the U.S. are as polarized today as they were around the time of the Civil War

In other words, for elected officials, today is as bad as the Civil War era, not worse than it.

The 1960s and 1970s also saw more political violence than today, even if ideological division may be wider now:

> Today’s abortion debates, which admittedly can be nasty, do not compare to violence of the 1970s and 1980s when there were 110 cases of arson or bombings

And:

> Though, the cumulative violence was worse a half century ago, with assassinations and bombings

3. The nuance: Elite polarization, mass perception, and reality

Researchers distinguish between different types of polarization:

That leads to a perception gap. Studies find:

> perceived polarization was greater than actual polarization, in two key respects: 1) for nearly every issue, people believed that the two parties were further apart than they actually are

> Over the years and across issues, people generally exaggerated polarization, overestimating the mean difference between Democrats’ and Republicans’ attitudes

> American voters are less ideologically polarized than they think they are, and that misperception is greatest for the most politically engaged people

Cambridge researcher Dr Lee de-Wit, author of the study finding a 64% increase since 1988, argues polarization can feel much worse than it is:

> Political groups have moved further apart in recent years, but these divisions are still fuzzy, and Americans are not split into entirely opposing tribes when it comes to the issues

In short: If you mean the last 50-80 years - the era of modern polling, the post-WWII bipartisan period, and the availability of ideology scores - then yes, polarization is worse than at any time in that window. If you mean all of American history, no - the Civil War era, and arguably the late 1960s in terms of violence, were more divided.

What is arguably new is not that Americans disagree more on every policy, but that partisan identity has become more sorted with ideology, race and religion, that there is virtually no ideological overlap left in Congress, and that partisan antipathy - viewing the other side as a disliked out-group - is rising faster in the U.S. than in other comparable democracies.