A more severe provocation increases violence justification, but it does NOT shrink the partisan double standard.

Study is forthcoming in Public Opinion Quarterly, coauthored w/ @lilymasonphd.bsky.social, Cornelius Cappelen and Tor Midtbø.

Both sides apply clear double standards when judging identical acts of violence. Strong partisans are nearly 3 times more likely to explicitly justify acts of partisan political violence against the opposition (27–30%) than against their own party (10–11%).

Using a survey experiment with a realistic political rally scenario, we manipulate who commits violence (inparty, outparty, no party) and how severe the provocation is. Across conditions, partisan identity acts as a powerful perceptual filter.

Do Americans judge acts of partisan political violence impartially? No. We show that Democrats and Republicans exhibit clear partisan bias: both see the same violent act as more justified when it targets the other party than when it targets their own side.

osf.io/preprints/so...

#polisky

Sketch - this guy is loosely inspired by packet of crumpled McDonalds fries someone had tossed away in the woods ;)

New chapter on affective polarization and support for political violence (open access): www.elgaronline.com/edcollchap-o...

Level of partisan hostility varies substantially between democracies. Showcase: How many think that threatening outparty supporters online is acceptable?

🇧🇷Brazil & 🇺🇸USA top the list at ~26%.

🇸🇪Sweden is lowest at ~6%.

Source: CONAP dataset (2022).

Polisky

People think many party supporters are willing to engage in political violence💀

Outparty vs Inparty (%)
🇧🇷52-43 both sides seen as💀
🇺🇸49-34
🇬🇧35-24
🇫🇷46-23
🇪🇸57-22, largest gap (%)
🇵🇱56-26
🇩🇪47-18
🇮🇹40-21
🇸🇪29-12, lowest💀

Outparty supporters seen as more willing.

CONAP 22 data

Polisky