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Democratic Elections Fuel Strong Trust Gaps Between Rival Partisans

partisanship

democratic politics

partisan trust gap

social identity theory

Political Competition, Partisanship and Interpersonal Trust in Electoral Democracies was authored by Ryan E. Carlin and Gregory J. Love. It was published by Cambridge in BJPS in 2018.

Connecting democratic politics to social cooperation debates, this research explores partisan trust discrimination.

Social Identity + Cognitive Heuristics

The theory posits that partisanship acts as a powerful identity marker in electoral democracies.

Interparty Competition Amplifies Trust Gaps

Evidence from behavioral experiments across eight democracies shows these trust gaps are ubiquitous and larger than those stemming from other social identities foundational to the party system.

Critical Findings

These gaps appear transient, disappearing after major political events like bin Laden's death in the U.S.;

Observational data reveal these partisan trust gaps correlate closely with perceived polarization;

The effect of partisanship on trust exceeds that found in minimal group studies.

The research concludes: heightened political competition significantly shapes how partisanship influences interpersonal trust, a key foundation for cooperation.