Does Polarization Equal Secession?

Does Polarization Equal Secession?

By Gina Margolies

October 1, 2020

DIVIDED WE FALL

America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation

By David French

288 pp. St. Martin’s Press.

The term “focus group” is often associated with elections. Political candidates conduct focus groups to gather opinions on a particular issue, hone their messaging, test the efficacy of commercials, and, if rumors are true, to determine what clothing to wear to a debate. Focus groups have much wider, if less well known, uses also. For example, I conducted focus groups all around the country for over twenty years as part of my employment at a consulting firm. I was helping clients assess risk and improve messaging related to legal matters. As a side bonus, I got to observe, listen to, and talk with thousands of Americans all around the country about every topic under the sun. As a natural consequence, I was in a good position to observe polarization in American society, the subject of David French’s new book Divided We Fall.

French issues his cri de coeur in the first line of the book. “It’s time for Americans to wake up to a fundamental reality: the continued unity of the United States of America cannot be guaranteed.” French goes to describe a phenomenon he sees as prevalent. The term “negative polarization” expresses the ideas that political affiliation is based more on what we hate and fear than on what we agree with or support and that we label those who disagree with us as evil or even somehow less than human. French, discussing his service in Iraq, describes the motivation for the Sunnis and Shiites to fight as “those horrible people cannot be permitted to win,” drawing a parallel to our current political climate. Where does this end? According to French, in secession.

I am not convinced we are quite as divided as French says. This may be due to my sociologist’s habit of being suspicious of arguments based largely on New York Times articles and FiveThirtyEight. (French also cites his own articles as supporting evidence.) Anyone who even glances at headlines knows that the media has had a field day with graphic representations of how divided we are. Some days I feel like I am being prepped for Armageddon. Citations aside, my hesitancy is based more upon my experience in the trenches with my focus groups. I certainly saw political disagreements grow in the time period French considers. I also experienced a phenomenon I came to term “the great disconnect.” On a consistent basis, I would conduct a focus group and the top three issues that had dominated the media and culture industries for days or weeks would not be mentioned, not even once over the course of an eight-hour, twelve-person discussion during which participants were encouraged to raise topics that were important to them. Often, when I asked the groups about particular issues they would either have not even heard about them or had heard but were not interested in discussing them. Yes, you can call up a thousand Americans and ask them a yes/no question. You will get respective percentages for each response. This does not mean that any of the thousand actually care about the issue or that their thoughts or behavior are in any way motivated by it. It just means that you asked them for an opinion about something you think is important and in that one moment in time, they answered yes or no to a question. No one reports on the polls that show things that I regularly saw in my focus groups, or on all of the issues upon which many Americans agree. Most saliently, I saw, amongst thousands and thousands of Americans of every political stripe that almost all of them love their country, even the ones who despise the current President. In twenty years, I never once heard any American use the word “secession,” not even in Texas and California, French’s two likely candidates to lead a secessionist charge.

Statistics show that Americans watch different TV shows, like different sports, have different views on gun ownership, and different levels of religiosity. These differences do break out geographically in the sense that blue states house more basketball watchers and Game of Thrones fans, while red states like guns and God more. And yes, the last few elections have not seen landslide results for either side but rather have demonstrated a political divide. Does the divide rise to the level where secession is a realistic possibility? To answer that French identifies some similarities between the geographic split and cultural divide in the pre-Civil War period and today. He focuses most particularly on the political map’s contiguous colors and the perceived fear that the “other” group is threatening to “our way of life,” and liberty thus one must act in self-defense. French notes that the threat to liberty was the reason for the “geographical secession” that was the American Revolution, replete with cultural homogeneity and belief that the opponent had exhibited disregard for liberty and even lives. Although I am not fully persuaded that a secessionist threat looms, I am willing to accept French’s thesis as one of several possible outcomes if we continue down the road of dividing ourselves into ever smaller adversarial factions.

All that being said, part of French’s solution makes so much sense it should be considered even if the magnitude of the problem it intends to solve is not of dire proportions. French counsels pluralism by which he means defending for others the rights you value for yourself and defending the rights of communities to govern themselves according to their values provided they do not violate the rights of their dissenting members. In other words, more American Revolution than French Revolution. French sums up his advice by saying, “Embrace the idea that your fellow citizens, even those who disagree with you, should feel at home in this land.”

Pluralism, acceptance, tolerance, community, these concepts all feel right and make sense. Federalism, or as French puts it, “tolerance through self-governance and community autonomy” with a federal government that protects the rights of all citizens is attractive. The example French uses to exemplify his proposed return to federalism is that drag queen story hour in California libraries would be accepted and Colorado bakers would be permitted to pass on making a cake for a same-sex wedding. Reflecting back on my focus groups, I can envision some of the Americans I spoke with accepting this scenario. Will those who occupy the flanks of both sides be willing to tolerate this level of tolerance? Conversely, will the flanks be willing to secede from the Union rather than accept one or the other of these positions? French’s book does not really answer this question. Rather, he provides an alternative route to increasing polarization, one that is deserving of consideration by all Americans, no matter the color of our state. Our unity might depend on it.