> It ultimately ends in total polarization," illustrates co-author David Garcia (CSH and MedUni Vienna). Not only do people categorically favor or oppose single issues like abortion, same-sex marriage and nuclear energy. "If they are pro-choice, they are at the same time highly likely to be for gay marriage, against the use of nuclear energy, for the legalization of marijuana, and so on," says Garcia. The possible variety of combinations of different opinions is reduced to the traditional left-right split.

This is an interesting observation, because while we think of all these things as related ideologically, they aren’t necessarily. For example, both Denmark and New Zealand have liberal new Prime Ministers who are women, pro-LGBT, pro-welfare state, and quite strongly anti-immigration. (New Zealand’s PM, Jacinda Ardern, has received very positive media coverage in the U.S., but is part of a ruling coalition with the “New Zealand First” Party, such that her deputy PM is an anti-immigration right-winger.) So the issues on which the “left” and “right” have formed coalitions aren’t necessarily ideological but are to some extent the artifact of history.