IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/34229.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Latent Polarization

Author

Listed:
  • Klaus Desmet
  • Ignacio Ortuño-Ortín
  • Romain Wacziarg

Abstract

We develop a new method to endogenously partition society into groups based on homophily in values, using fractional hedonic games as a theoretical foundation. The between-group differentiation that results from this partition provides a novel measure of latent polarization in society. We implement this method empirically using U.S. data from the World Values Survey. For the last forty years, the degree of latent polarization of the U.S. public has been high and relatively stable. In contrast, the degree of values polarization between voters of the two main political parties has steadily increased since the 1990s, and is now converging toward that of underlying values-based clusters. Thus, growing partisan polarization in the U.S. is a reflection of partisan views becoming increasingly aligned with the main values-based clusters in society.

Suggested Citation

  • Klaus Desmet & Ignacio Ortuño-Ortín & Romain Wacziarg, 2025. "Latent Polarization," NBER Working Papers 34229, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34229
    Note: POL
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w34229.pdf
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text is generally limited to series subscribers, however if the top level domain of the client browser is in a developing country or transition economy free access is provided. More information about subscriptions and free access is available at http://www.nber.org/wwphelp.html. Free access is also available to older working papers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations
    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • Z1 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34229. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.