‘AFFECTIVE POLARIZATION HAS AN EVEN WORSE EFFECT ON THE DEGREE OF SATISFACTION WITH DEMOCRACY’: ELENA MARTÍNEZ, RESEARCHER
By Ricardo Alexandre / TSF Radio
The radio program O Estadio do Sitio, of TSF Radio, Portugal, was attended by Elena Martinez Barahona, to explain about a political and social phenomenon called ‘affective polarization’.
Martinez Barahona holds a PhD in Political Science from the European University Institute of Florence. She is also a researcher at the Iberoamerican Institute of the University of Salamanca and researcher of the Josefina Cuesta Chair of Historical Memory. She is currently working at the Institute of Social Sciences in Lisbon.
She came to Portugal at the invitation of the Chair of Ibero-American Studies of the Portuguese office of the Organization of Ibero-American States and the UAL (Autonomous University of Lisbon).
You say that one of the main problems we have today in political and social terms is an affective polarization. What is this about?
In the past, in political science we always talked about ideological polarization, that is, the distance of ideological convictions we have in relation to the other. Now, there is a new term that has been coined in political science, which is affective polarization. It has to do with emotions and is considered to have an even worse effect on the degree of satisfaction with democracy. It consists of not tolerating the other. Democracy is based on consensus and, instead, we encourage hooligan politics. In other words, we belong to a political party and we do not compromise or tolerate anything that has to do with another party. This is very evident, for example, in the Spanish case and it is evident in other contexts, both in Latin America and in the United States. There is this kind of reference to our political party as if it were a soccer team that does not tolerate the other. And that ends up having very pernicious effects for democracy.
In Spain, in a way, the most central parties have always been like that, the Popular Party and the Socialist Party, but now they seem to be more and more polarized… is this case of alleged corruption with the wife of the president of the government and President Sanchez considering resigning and then deciding to continue but blaming the media for the ideological area of the PP also a symptom of this polarization?
Yes, of course. I think that in Spain two blocs have been created. There are two ideologically differentiated blocs, the right-wing bloc and the left-wing bloc. And there is no tolerance between the two. Many of my friends who have published books analyzing the Spanish situation talk about the lack of tolerance. Alternation has to do with good democratic health. But now we are seeing that those who lose elections are questioning the legitimacy of those who won. We have seen it lately in our democracies.
And this is something extremely dangerous, because if we start to distrust the electoral process, we start to call the person who wins the election an “illegitimate occupier” or someone who is supported by terrorists or philo-terrorists. And we start to have this level of polarization in words and in political discourse. In the end, it’s democracy that’s at risk. So I think this is the big problem we have today, which is not tolerating the other, not tolerating political pluralism, which I think is the main essence of democracy. There are those who define – it is very difficult to define democracy – that democracy is the political regime in which it is accepted that elections can be lost. And that’s very good, isn’t it? Of course, it is a minimalist definition, but if we do not accept that elections can be lost and we dedicate ourselves to attacking the other, we really have a problem with the credibility of democratic institutions and this can have pernicious effects in the short and long term.
When we were talking about the more specific situation in Latin America, the increase in inequalities, also the increase in violence, you mentioned another term, which is a term that has only recently been formulated in political science, which is performative punitivism, performative punishment. What does that mean?
I think that illegal markets, drug trafficking and violence have permeated state institutions, which means that government institutions can punish visible behaviors, but they tolerate invisible behaviors, that is, situations are disguised because they don’t suit the state, because it’s informal money that often circulates through the state. So often, when people talk about a failed state, I am suspicious. I distrust because there are times when the State fails. Drug trafficking also finances electoral campaigns. So where does the state end and where does it begin? It is very complicated because there is a lot of State involvement in things that do not belong to it. The State is part of the wheel and I think that is the most complicated mechanism. You can see it perfectly in prisons, that is, prisons are a breeding ground for illegal businesses or informal markets, where drug trafficking networks and illegal markets are maintained.
Sometimes they even prosper more than when the leaders are free, that is, they are incarcerated and the business flourishes even more from prison.
Yes, of course. And people ask: how can this happen? Well, sometimes punitive answers are not the best answer. It is true that, for example, in El Salvador it was possible to dismantle this network of co-opting people, but let’s see how long it lasts, it is complicated. That is why we usually speak of performative punitivism, which is an expression I also like very much.
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