As elections in the west look more like yes-no referendums, liberal democracy is losing its capacity to resolve our conflicts
It is scarcely news that the US is divided – by geography, education and above all a diffuse set of moral and political attitudes that get thrown into the basket labelled “culture”. In the wake of an election that saw Donald Trump win around 47% of the popular vote, there is a renewed anxiety about the depth of partisan polarisation in American life. The worry is that liberals and conservatives don’t simply disagree on values any longer, but stare at different realities – whether on cable news or their Facebook feeds.
This is the context for the lurking sense of unease that surrounds Trump’s welcome ejection from the White House: what exactly has been resolved? More importantly for the future, can the institutions of liberal democracy – elected representatives, mass political parties and government officialdom – still resolve such conflicts?