Affective polarization definition
Affective polarization means that divisions have become character- ized by a merging between people’s stance on contested issues and their religious, cultural and racial identities (Hetherington and Rudolph 2018; Iyengar et al. 2019; Mason 2016, 2018). Divisions that used to be tied to specific questions, like war or abortion, have become bound to a wider sociocultural identity package. Evidence from the United States shows that Republican and Democrat voters are becoming less willing to marry or even socialize across partisan lines (Hetherington and Rudolph 2018; Iyengar et al. 2019). Lilliana Mason (2016) describes this as ‘social sorting’. She argues that the more ‘well-sorted’ people are, the more consistent they