Program on the Environment

Political polarization is a phenomenon observed in representative democracies when voters, political elites, and parties alike coalesce into distinct groups on opposing ends of a spectrum. This spectrum can range from anything as specific as an individual policy position to as broad as an ideology. In the United States, political polarization has become an increasingly crippling obstacle for the federal government to pass legislation written to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, some US cities and states have had incredible successes in passing legislation aimed at reducing their carbon emissions, amidst the stalemate in Congress. The purpose of this study was to analyze environmental attitudes and political ideologies to better understand the challenges that face the nation in respect to passing climate change legislation in light of political polarization. To accomplish this task, I interned with Cascadia Climate Action and the petition to the Nobel Foundation to administer a new Prize for climate action to contextualize my research. In addition, I utilized research databases to conduct a literature review, interviewed representatives from local environmental organizations, and administered my own 10 question survey asking participants about their environmental attitudes, political ideology and petition participation. Issue salience appears to be the strongest determining factor that I tested for contributing to political polarization concerning climate change, and generational attitudes appear to becoming more distinct concerning climate action. Both findings indicate a need to better coordinate climate activism in a more inclusive and sustainable fashion.