Both Left and Right Are Converging on Authoritarianism

Something is broken in our politics. Just about everyone knows it, but it can be hard to put your finger on what it is.

As the media attempt to grapple with this felt reality, they reach over and over for the same word: polarization. That, we're told, is the shorthand for what has gone wrong. Where once the country had its share of conservative Democrats, liberal Republicans, and mushy moderates, today the two parties are more internally consolidated—and further apart from each other—than ever.

But what if that explanation is missing something? What if there's a sense in which left and right are actually converging, and the nature of that convergence is the real source of the perception that something isn't right?

In 2014, Pew Research Center released a report on the crisis of polarization. "The overall share of Americans who express consistently conservative or consistently liberal opinions has doubled over the past two decades," it explained. "Today, 92% of Republicans are to the right of the median Democrat, and 94% of Democrats are to the left of the median Republican."