Ann OBERHAUSER, Iowa State University, United States
The recent growth of populism across Europe and the U.S. signals a decline in political moderation and a sharp turn to partisan polarization, authoritarianism, and ethno-nationalism. This paper focuses on the socio-economic landscape of politics in the United States and Europe to examine the significance of social identities in this changing political culture. The research draws from critical analyses of relevant feminist and political geographic literature to examine the factors that contribute to this rising nationalism and polarization of societies. In particular, the paper will discuss how political polarization is contextualized as part of settler colonial identities and the normalization of gendered whiteness. This research demonstrates how factors that tend to bind people into communities of identity - rurality, whiteness, and working class – are the very factors that drive political polarization. Findings indicate that both rurality and social identities such as gender, race, and class contribute to political shifts in recent elections and overall divides in our contemporary political climate. This research has significant implications for broader regional and national political culture and electoral patterns in the future.
Mots clés : Political identities|Populism|Polarization|Gender|Xenophobia
A103153AO