Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

The development of partisan polarization over the Green New Deal

Nature Climate Change volume 9, pages 940–944 (2019)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

In early 2019, a US climate change and economic renewal policy proposal called the Green New Deal (GND)1 rose from obscurity to national prominence in just four months. This situation created a natural field experiment in which to study the emergence of partisan polarization. Here, we report findings from two nationally representative surveys of registered US voters that measured familiarity with and support for the GND shortly before and after the issue entered the national spotlight. Initially, there was low public awareness of the GND but majority support for it across party lines. Four months later, voters had become much more familiar with the GND and partisan polarization had increased significantly due to a sharp decrease in support among Republicans. In fact, Republicans who had heard the most about the GND were the least likely to support it. In contrast, support for the GND remained high among Democrats, and did not vary substantially across degrees of familiarity. We also identify a likely mechanism: a ‘Fox News effect’. That is, among Republicans, Fox News viewing was a significant predictor of both familiarity with the GND and opposition to it, even when controlling for alternative explanations.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Proportions of political segments who have heard about the GND.
Fig. 2: Changes in support for the GND, by political segments.
Fig. 3: Proportions of Democrats and Republicans who support the GND, by how much they have heard about it.
Fig. 4: Changes in awareness and support by partisan media exposure.

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

References

  1. H. Res. 109. Recognizing the Duty of the Federal Government to Create a Green New Deal (116th United States Congress, 2019); https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-resolution/109/text

  2. Carlock, G., Mangan, E. & McElwee, S. A Green New Deal: A Progressive Vision for Environmental Sustainability and Economic Stability (Data for Progress, 2018); https://www.dataforprogress.org/green-new-deal-report

  3. Leiserowitz, A. et al. Politics & Global Warming, December 2018 (Yale Univ. and George Mason Univ., Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, 2019); https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/NBJGS

  4. Leiserowitz, A. et al. Energy in the American Mind, December 2018 (Yale Univ. and George Mason Univ., Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, 2019); https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/BDQ25

  5. Druckman, J. N., Peterson, E. & Slothuus, R. How elite partisan polarization affects public opinion formation. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 107, 57–79 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Taber, C. S. & Lodge, M. Motivated skepticism in the evaluation of political beliefs. Am. J. Polit. Sci. 50, 755–769 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Zaller, J. R. The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1992).

  8. Levendusky, M. S. Why do partisan media polarize viewers? Am. J. Polit. Sci. 57, 611–623 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Druckman, J. N. & McGrath, M. C. The evidence for motivated reasoning in climate change preference formation. Nat. Clim. Change 9, 111–119 (2019).

  10. Cohen, G. L. Party over policy: the dominating impact of group influence on political beliefs. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 85, 808–822 (2003).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Van Boven, L., Ehret, P. J. & Sherman, D. K. Psychological barriers to bipartisan public support for climate policy. Perspect. Psychol. Sci. 13, 492–507 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Abortion Trends by Party Identification (Gallup, 2019); https://news.gallup.com/poll/246278/abortion-trends-party.aspx

  13. Friedman, L. What is the Green New Deal? A climate proposal, explained. The New York Times (21 February 2019); https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/21/climate/green-new-deal-questions-answers.html

  14. Friedman, L. Dianne Feinstein lectures children who want Green New Deal, portraying it as untenable. The New York Times (22 February 2019); https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/22/climate/feinstein-sunrise-green-new-deal.html

  15. MacDonald, T. Fox News Dominated Prime-time Cable Coverage of the Green New Deal (Media Matters for America, 2019); https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2019/02/14/Fox-News-dominated-prime-time-cable-coverage-of-the-Green-New-Deal/222875

  16. MacDonald, T. Fox News Discussed the Green New Deal More Often than CNN and MSNBC (Media Matters for America, 2019); https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2019/04/09/Fox-News-discussed-the-Green-New-Deal-more-often-than-CNN-and-MSNBC-combined/223383

  17. Voting and Registration in the Election of November 2018 (US Census Bureau, 2019); https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/voting-and-registration/p20-583.html

  18. Bartels, L. M. Messages received: the political impact of media exposure. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 87, 267–285 (1993).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Iyengar, S. & Kinder, D. R. News That Matters: Television and American Opinion (Univ. Chicago, 1987).

  20. Hindman, D. B. Mass media flow and differential distribution of politically disputed beliefs: the belief gap hypothesis. J. Mass Commun. Q. 86, 790–808 (2009).

    Google Scholar 

  21. Veenstra, A. S., Hossain, M. D. & Lyons, B. A. Partisan media and discussion as enhancers of the belief gap. Mass Commun. Soc. 17, 874–897 (2014).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Zaller, J. in Political Persuasion and Attitude Change (eds Mutz, D. et al.) 17–78 (Univ. Michigan Press, 1996).

  23. Hart, P. S. Market influences on climate change frames in CNN and Fox News climate change broadcasts. In International Communication Association Annual Meeting “Communicating for Social Impact” (International Communication Association, 2008).

  24. Feldman, L., Maibach, E. W., Roser-Renouf, C. & Leiserowitz, A. Climate on cable: the nature and impact of global warming coverage on fox news, CNN, and MSNBC. Int. J. Press Polit. 17, 3–31 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Krosnick, J. A. & MacInnis, B. Frequent Viewers of Fox News Are Less Likely to Accept Scientists’ Views of Global Warming (The Woods Institute for the Environment, 2010).

  26. Paternoster, R., Brame, R., Mazerolle, P. & Piquero, A. Using the correct statistical test for the equality of regression coefficients. Criminology 36, 859–866 (1998).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Prior, M. The challenge of measuring media exposure: reply to Dilliplane, Goldman, and Mutz. Polit. Commun. 30, 620–634 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. van der Linden, S., Leiserowitz, A., Rosenthal, S. & Maibach, E. Inoculating the public against misinformation about climate change. Glob. Chall. 1, 1600008 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Levendusky, M. S. Americans, not partisans: can priming American national identity reduce affective polarization? J. Polit. 80, 59–70 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  30. Benegal, S. D. & Scruggs, L. A. Correcting misinformation about Climate Change: the impact of partisanship in an experimental setting. Climatic Change 148, 61–80 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  31. Mildenberger, M. & Tingley, D. Beliefs about climate beliefs: the importance of second-order opinions for climate politics. Br. J. Polit. Sci. 1279–1307 (2017).

Download references

Acknowledgements

Funding for this research was provided by the 11th Hour Project, the Endeavor Foundation, the Energy Foundation, the Grantham Foundation, and the MacArthur Foundation.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

    Abel Gustafson, Seth A. Rosenthal, Matthew T. Ballew, Matthew H. Goldberg, Parrish Bergquist & Anthony Leiserowitz

  2. Center for Climate Change Communication, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA, USA

    John E. Kotcher & Edward W. Maibach

Authors
  1. Abel Gustafson
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Seth A. Rosenthal
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Matthew T. Ballew
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Matthew H. Goldberg
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Parrish Bergquist
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. John E. Kotcher
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Edward W. Maibach
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  8. Anthony Leiserowitz
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

A.G., S.A.R, M.T.B., M.H.G., P.B., J.E.K., E.W.M. and A.L. developed the study idea and designed the research. A.G. analysed the data, designed the visualizations and wrote the manuscript. S.A.R, M.T.B., M.H.G., P.B., J.E.K., E.W.M. and A.L. provided many valuable revisions.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Abel Gustafson.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Peer review information Nature Climate Change thanks Toby Bolsen, Benjamin Lyons and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary information

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Gustafson, A., Rosenthal, S.A., Ballew, M.T. et al. The development of partisan polarization over the Green New Deal. Nat. Clim. Chang. 9, 940–944 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0621-7

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0621-7

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing