What do Trump’s statements on Iran suggest about his approach to the legal constraints governing armed conflict?

After recent negotiations between Iran and the United States failed to yield a deal, President Trump Donald declared yesterday that he would impose a naval blockade against Iran to close the Strait of Hormuz– an escalation that threatens to unravel a delicate two-week ceasefire brokered less than a week ago. Taken together with his recent rhetoric, these statements point to a readiness to consider expansive military action, including strikes on civilian infrastructure, that would invoke key legal principles governing the law of armed conflict.

Trump’s recent quotes have been extraordinarily alarming both in tone and substance. Last week,  perhaps most extreme was his threat that he would wipe out a “whole civilization” in Iran. Preceding this was his declaration: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the F‑‑‑in’ [Hormuz] Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH!” This rhetoric, which shows a willingness to perpetrate excessive civilian harm, a war crime, raises serious concerns about indiscriminate attacks on civilians and the requirements of distinction and proportionality.

These were not isolated comments. Trump has repeatedly threatened sweeping, large-scale violence in Iran, stating on 5 April, “If they don’t make a deal, I am blowing up everything over there”— language that, if put into practice, would be difficult to reconcile with established legal constraints on targeting in armed conflict. In case there was any doubt about what he meant, Trump pledged that he would bomb Iran “back to the Stone Ages.” For Trump, this isn’t just about military escalation. It’s about casting aside fundamental legal constraints that have traditionally governed the law of war. “All Hell will reign [sic] down” on the Iranians, Trump said, “Glory be to GOD!”

Was Trump’s language on Iran in any way predictable?

None of Trump’s recent statements should be a surprise. Americans voted for a man in 2024 who had long made clear what he thought about the law of war. Before he was reelected, Trump repeatedly signaled his disregard for the law of armed conflict. He called the Geneva Conventions, which outline the international rules governing conflict, “the problem” and “out of date.”

That’s just the beginning. Trump promised to bring back “a helluva lot worse than waterboarding” and claimed that torture “absolutely works.” He complained of the necessity for the United States to fight “politically correct” wars while terrorists “chopp[ed] off heads.” He threatened to pillage Middle Eastern oil fields for profit and to bomb cultural sites. Trump said that, in dealing with terrorists and state sponsors of terror, America needs to “fight fire with fire.” He also declared that the US military should target the families of terrorists, which would breach the principle of civilian immunity during conflicts.

These statements again suggest not only Trump’s indifference to the law of war, but his outright hostility to it. That’s not even to mention Trump pardoning multiple US service members accused or convicted of war crimes during his first term, while simultaneously mocking their prosecutions. “We train our boys to be killing machines,” he quipped, “then prosecute them when they kill!”

“P20260309DT-0502” by The White House, United States Government Work

Why does Trump insist on showing disdain for the law of war?

That answer to that’s simple: It’s red meat for his electoral base. Trump knows his audience revels in his incendiary, tough-guy talk, so he consistently delivers statements that exceed those expectations. Each time, he needs to go further because it’s hard for Trump to beat his own shock value. Trump will be Trump, but the more consequential issue is the near-total absence of meaningful pushback from fellow Republicans in Congress, coupled with Fox News and other conservative media outlets reframing and defending his remarks as somehow normal.

In my 2025 book Killing Machines, I explained that Trump only gets away with his attacks on the law of war because of the “impunity coalition”: Trump, Fox News, and GOP allies on Capitol Hill together operate in a mutually reinforcing loop—amplifying, legitimizing, and shielding one another from criticism. Before Trump rose to power, many GOP Congress members would speak about the imperative for the United States to conform to the law of war. Today, that language has largely dissipated. Likewise, while Fox News once showed flashes of criticism toward some of Trump’s early statements on these issues, it’s now difficult to find any scrutiny of his rhetoric.

For Trump, deafening silence from the political right makes all things possible. Trump himself has captured the logic of his own impunity bluntly: “I don’t need international law…My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”

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The post Trump’s threats of extreme violence against Iran show his continuing disdain for the law of war first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

In a recent article in Democratization, the director of Sweden’s VDEM institute claimed that in 2025 the United States was no longer a democracy. The country “has joined Hungary, India, Türkiye and others among the electoral autocracies.” Admittedly, when times are good for democracies there is euphoria about the democratic process. And when challenges face democracies, the doomsayers emerge. In the new edition of Citizen Politics and Democracy we take a close look at the challenges that are facing democracies and their citizens.

Democratic challenges in the US and elsewhere

We see problems in contemporary democracies. The current administration in Washington is pushing against the foundations of the democratic process—in ways not seen since the Vietnam War and Civil Rights struggle of the 1960s, the Red Scare of the 1950s, or earlier periods in America’s democratic history. Politics in affluent democracies have become more fragmented and more polarized, and this tests the vitality of democracy.

Our new book, based on cross-national public opinion surveys, shows that people are more critical of politicians, political parties, and national legislatures than they were a generation ago. For example, long-term trends in four established democracies found that fewer and fewer citizens feel that politicians care about what they think (Figure 1). Trust in political parties and national legislatures has also declined. Political dissatisfaction is now common in most affluent democracies.

Figure 1 – Percent of citizens who feel politicians care in four democracies

Sources: American National Election Studies, 1956–2024; 1992-2024 British Election Surveys, 1992-2024; German Election Studies, 1969–2021; French SOFRES Polls, 1977– 97, French Election Studies, 2017-2024.

Yet, the foundation of democracy is its citizens, and citizen support for democracy remains strong. For example, the recent Pew Global Survey (2023) finds that most citizens are positive about representative democracy as ways to govern— Americans and Swedes are both above average (Figure 2). Individuals in all of these nations rank autocratic government in a distant last place. Despite cries that the sky is falling, the available evidence suggests that most citizens in affluent democracies still clearly favour a democratic form of government.

Figure 2 – Support for different forms of government

Source: Pew Global Survey

We expect that most Americans, US elected officials, the judiciary, and representatives of civil society agree.

Reasons to be positive about the state of American democracy

Our research leads us to be more optimistic about American democracy. First, Americans and citizens in other affluent democracies are the most educated in their nations’ history. They are more interested in politics, have greater access to information, and are more politically active than any prior electorate. They are more socially tolerant than prior publics. People are also more conscious of their political and individual rights. If there is a problem with democracy, it isn’t because the calibre of the citizenry has diminished. Social change has transformed the citizenry overall in positive ways.

“Democracy is not a spectator sport” by Adam Fagen, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Equally important, compared to all other regime forms, democracy has a built-in self correction method. The diffusion of power, and checks and balances limit the ability of any one force to dominate the process. Most powerful is the voters’ ability to see the error of their previous party choices and vote them out at the next election. Current evidence points in this direction for the 2026 US elections.

So why is democracy struggling in the US and many other established democracies? Political leaders may be at the root of the problem. Vanderbilt University political scientist, Larry Bartels maintains that democracy is being challenged by a growing number of opportunistic and ambitious political elites on both the Left and the Right—elites who put re-election and personal gain at the top of their priorities.

Democracy, Bartels wrote, “erodes from the top.” Similarly, the late political theorist, Benjamin Barber wrote: “Democracy doesn’t place endless faith in the capacity of individuals to govern themselves, but it affirms with Machiavelli that the multitude will on the whole be as wise or wiser than princes”.

How to improve the democratic process

Our analyses find that the typical citizen has become a dissatisfied democrat who rates a democratic system as very important, while rating the extent of democracy in their nation as substantially lower. This leads to the question of what can be done to improve the democratic process. The Pew Center has offered two broad areas for consideration.

• Improving political leadership: Respondents want politicians who are more responsive to the public’s needs, more attentive to the public’s voice, less corrupt, and more competent. Many would also like political leaders to be more representative of their country’s population in terms of gender, age, race, and other factors.
• Government reform: Many believe improving democracy will require significant political reform in their country. Views about what reform should look like vary, but suggestions include changing electoral systems, shifting the balance of power between institutions, and placing limits on how long politicians and judges can serve. In several countries, people express a desire for more direct democracy.

It is good that citizens (and academics) worry about the vitality of democracy in their nation, and we applaud their concern. A key lesson is to be vigilant about what we have and how we can improve the system. From the founders of American democracy to contemporary scholars, the citizenry has been seen the major constraint on the potential excesses of government. Most Americans do indeed favour democracy, as does a vibrant civil society, the judiciary, and (if polls are correct) a changing majority in the House of Representatives after the 2026 election. In sum, to paraphrase Mark Twain: the reports of democracy’s death are an exaggeration.

• This article is based on the new book, “Citizen Politics and Democracy”.
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• Note: This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of USAPP – American Politics and Policy, nor the London School of Economics.

The post Americans favour democracy in principle, but poor political leadership means they are dissatisfied with it in practice first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

How much influence does Pete Hegseth really wield over US military policy—and is he effectively directing America’s strategy toward Iran?

Since the US began its military action against Iran on 28 February the Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth has been as much of the face of the war as President Donald Trump. Here’s the truth of the matter: I don’t think many people appreciate just how powerful Hegseth really is. You look at Hegseth’s position, US Secretary of War, and by dint of that fact alone he’s the most influential military official in the world. But that’s just the start of it. Hegseth has the ear of the president, plain and simple, in a way that almost no one else in his administration has. Even dating back to his days as a Fox News host, he was dictating Trump’s military policy. He insinuated a role in the killing of Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani, successfully called for the pardoning of multiple US service members accused or convicted of war crimes, and urged the president to widely loosen military rules of engagement.

Now, Hegseth says that he’s “negotiating with bombs” in Iran—and he means it. Pentagon policy is ruled by Hegseth, and all indications are that Trump has given him almost complete agency to use American military might how he wants. For anyone wondering who’s pulling the strings on Iran, there’s no need to overthink it. It’s not Stephen Miller or anyone inside the West Wing. Look no further than Hegseth.

How does Hegseth envision US power being used in Iran?

Hegseth doesn’t think that the US military should just play a deterrent role in Iran. Instead, he wants to use American firepower to settle scores and act as the world’s police force. That doesn’t mean stepping down actions in Iran in just a few weeks when many, even most, military objectives are finished. It means degrading Iran’s military and nuclear capabilities so severely that it no longer poses a threat to America or to the region. What’s next? Neither Trump nor Hegseth has ruled out putting troops on the ground in Iran. That would be a major escalation of the conflict and put more American lives at risk. But remember: Hegseth’s calculation isn’t about using American guns and missiles to simply defend the homeland. He considers the use of US military force not as a last resort, but as a central instrument of American power. Now that the US is “bombing our little hearts out,” according to Trump, no one should look for Hegseth to be a pacifying voice. Instead, expect him to push for going even further: expanding the mission and framing escalation in Iran not as a risk to be managed but as an opportunity to decisively reshape the Middle East’s balance of power.

What do Hegseth’s past statements and actions indicate about his views on constraints in military operations?

If there’s one thing we know about Hegseth, it’s that he thinks that there are too many restraints placed on American servicemembers. This was the topic of my 2025 book, Killing Machines. In his confirmation hearings, Hegseth talked about untying the hands of military personnel and allowing them to fight fire with fire. This follows his prior statements to a tee, where Hegseth has discarded laws of war as not only anachronistic but “stupid.” In a 2019 Fox News op-ed, Hegseth wrote: “We send men to fight on our behalf, and too often second guess the manner in which they fight. Count me out on the Monday morning quarterbacking – I’m with the American warfighter, all the way.” This kind of language again dates to Hegseth’s role at Fox News, when he both publicly and privately lobbied Trump on military policy. One journalist, for example, reported at the time that “Hegseth’s behind-the-scenes work … underscores how heavily the president has relied on Fox News stars not just for support and messaging assistance but for actual counsel on policy.” Don’t think for a second that Hegseth’s counsel on military policy has diminished now that he’s traded the Fox News studio for his new digs at the Pentagon.

“260313-D-XO220-3393” by U.S. Secretary of War, Public Domain Mark

What does Hegseth’s rhetoric and conduct suggest about his approach to the law of war?

There’s a reason why Hegseth has become known as “Trump’s War Whisperer.” He treats international humanitarian law, the main corpus of law governing conflict globally, as optional for American service members. In fact, he’s often joked about it. After US forces targeted Venezuelan drug boats, for example, Hegseth tweeted a photo of the children’s book character Franklin throwing a rocket-propelled grenade at one of the boats in the water, which he titled “Franklin Targets Nacro Terrorists.”

Additionally, while he’s been at the Pentagon, Hegseth’s war messaging – which often relies on internet memes – has been criticized by many veterans for downplaying the seriousness of the law of war. Hegseth offers no apologies for suggesting that the Geneva Conventions needn’t be followed when American servicemembers are the ones carrying out the fighting. This reflects a broader worldview in which legal and normative constraints on the use of force are seen less as binding guardrails of international order and more as discretionary tools. In actuality, it’s a doctrine of war with the guardrails taken off—and the memes turned up.

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The post The US war on Iran is Pete Hegseth’s war first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

In January 2026 the Phelan US Centre spoke to Professor Shapiro about his new book. The conversation covered how the 2008 financial crisis and the collapse of inclusive economic growth has led to the growth of populism and a crisis of democracy. They also discussed the US’ turn away from democracy promotion and Trump’s “America First” policies and how political and economic elites must prioritise inclusive growth which can help to restore democratic legitimacy.

Further reading and resources

• After the Fall: From the End of History to the Crisis of Democracy, How Politicians Broke Our World, Ian Shapiro (Basic Books, 2026)
• The Wolf at the Door: The Menace of Economic Insecurity and How to Fight It, Michael J. Graetz and Ian Shapiro (Harvard University Press, 2020)
• The Real World of Democratic Theory, Ian Shapiro, (Princeton University Press, 2010)
• Working papers by Ian Shapiro: https://shapiro.macmillan.yale.edu/publications/working-papers
• Leitner Program on Effective Democratic Governance at the Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs: https://jackson.yale.edu/leitner-program-on-effective-democratic-governance/

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This podcast was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

• Featured image: Photo by The Now Time on Unsplash
• Note:  This podcast gives the views of the interviewee and host, and is not the position of USAPP – American Politics and Policy, the LSE Phelan US Centre, nor the London School of Economics.

The post After the Fall: From the End of History to the Crisis of Democracy with Professor Ian Shapiro | The Ballpark podcast first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

Cable news looks deeply divided—right up until a crisis forces it to snap into alignment.

For years, the dominant narrative has been that American cable news is defined by polarization. Fox News Channel, MSNBC, and CNN are often treated as separate ideological worlds, each reinforcing the beliefs of its audience. But that picture misses something important. When events become urgent, fast-moving, and unavoidable, these networks begin to behave far more similarly in how they cover events than we might expect.

In new research, we find that cable news polarization is not constant. It is conditional: shaped by crisis intensity, competition, and journalistic norms. At key moments, especially during major breaking events, cable news becomes less polarized. But that convergence is short-lived, and our research helps explain why polarization ultimately reasserts itself.

Polarization as the default assumption

The standard account of cable news rests on a straightforward idea: networks differentiate themselves ideologically – left or right – and audiences reward them for doing so. Over time, this produces a segmented media environment. Viewers gravitate toward outlets that align with their political preferences, and networks respond by reinforcing those preferences. From this perspective, polarization is not just present—it is built into the structure of the system.

This logic is well supported. Cable networks compete for attention, and ideological branding is one of the most effective ways to stand out. If one outlet occupies a particular niche, others have incentives to move in different directions. But this account assumes that differentiation is always the dominant force shaping coverage decisions. Our findings suggest that this is only part of the story.

A second force: journalism under pressure

Alongside branding and competition, cable news is also shaped by journalistic norms—especially during breaking news.

When major events unfold, journalists face intense pressure to provide timely and accurate information. In these moments, the incentives that typically drive differentiation can give way to a more basic imperative: cover the story and cover it quickly.

This is particularly true during what media scholars call “media storms”—events that are sudden, high-intensity, and important to a wide part of society. The early spread of COVID-19, the murder of George Floyd, and previous cases such as the deaths of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown all fit this pattern (captured broadly in the Black Lives Matter—BLM—movement).

In these situations, there is little time for networks to differentiate or selectively emphasize niche topics. Instead, they tend to focus on the same core developments. Professional norms—especially the obligation to inform the public—reinforce this convergence.

Photo by boris misevic on Unsplash

What the data show

To understand how these forces interact, we analyzed cable news coverage across several major events, including racial justice stories and the COVID-19 pandemic. Using time-series data from the Global Database of Events, Language, and Tone (GDELT), we tracked how frequently networks referenced specific topics and how those patterns evolved over time.

This approach allows us to observe not only what networks cover, but how their coverage changes in response to both events and competitors. Three patterns stand out about BLM and Covid-19 coverage in 2020. We show the statistical patterns in Figures 1 and 2.

Figure 1 – Cable news coverage by network and total mentions across networks

Panel A shows Black Lives Matter and COVID coverage by CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC over time. While COVID coverage remains elevated and relatively consistent across networks, Black Lives Matter coverage spikes sharply in late May–early June 2020 before quickly declining. Panel B zooms in on this period, showing that all three networks increase Black Lives Matter coverage simultaneously, indicating convergence in attention during the peak of the protests. Panel C shows total mentions aggregated across the three networks, highlighting the sustained, high-volume coverage of COVID compared to the more episodic spike in Black Lives Matter coverage. Source: Authors’ analysis of GDELT data.

Figure 2 – Divergence in race-story coverage after initial convergence

Panel A shows that race-story coverage across CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC initially rises together before separating over time. Panel B shows the widening coverage gaps after the peak, illustrating how divergence emerges across networks after the initial convergence phase. Source: Authors’ analysis of GDELT data.

1. Crises produce convergence

During the early stages of major events, cable news coverage converges. Across networks, attention to the same topics rises sharply and simultaneously. This pattern is visible in both COVID-19 coverage and the early phase of nationwide protests in 2020, as well as earlier high-profile cases. Even networks with well-established ideological identities increase their attention to the same issues at roughly the same time.

This convergence reflects the power of event-driven news. At these moments, cable news behaves less like a set of competing ideological brands and more like a shared system responding to a common external shock.

2. Convergence is temporary

This convergence does not persist. As events evolve from breaking news into sustained public debate, the incentives that drive differentiation reassert themselves. Networks begin to shift both their attention and their framing in ways that align with their audiences and brand identities.

COVID-19 coverage, for example, moves from a shared focus on case counts and public health developments to a more contested space shaped by partisan interpretations of policy responses. Coverage of racial justice protests follows a similar trajectory, diverging in tone and emphasis as the events become politically charged. This produces a two-stage pattern:

• Initial convergence during high-intensity moments
• Subsequent divergence as the story becomes contested

What appears to be a polarized media system is, in practice, one that becomes polarized over time following major events.

3. Networks respond to one another

Our third finding is that cable news networks adjust their coverage in response to each other. Changes in coverage on one network are associated with measurable changes on others. When one outlet increases its attention to a topic, competitors often follow—particularly in the early stages of a story. Over time, those relationships can shift, with networks reducing coverage or redirecting attention as part of a differentiation strategy.

This pattern suggests that cable news operates as a competitive ecosystem rather than a set of isolated actors. Networks are not only responding to events; they are also responding to one another. In effect, coverage decisions reflect a form of real-time strategic interaction within a shared media environment.

Framing, legitimacy, and narrative competition

These dynamics are especially visible in coverage of politically sensitive issues.

During the Black Lives Matter protests, for example, networks differed not only in how they framed events, but also in whether they emphasized protesters’ grievances or public order concerns. Some coverage highlighted systemic inequality and calls for reform, while other coverage focused on unrest or law enforcement perspectives. These differences reflect broader patterns of narrative competition, where media outlets shape not only what people know, but how they interpret it.

At the same time, the shared attention given to these issues – especially in their early stages – suggests that even highly polarized media environments retain moments of alignment around what matters most.

Why this matters for policy and public understanding

If polarization is conditional rather than constant, then the media environment may be more fluid—and more responsive to events—than is often assumed.

For policymakers, this suggests that moments of crisis may create brief windows in which shared information reaches broad audiences across ideological lines. For journalists, it underscores the continuing importance of professional norms in shaping coverage when stakes are highest.

For the public, the findings point to a more dynamic media system—one where division is not fixed but emerges over time as competition and interpretation take hold.

Rethinking polarization

These findings complicate the standard narrative about cable news.

Polarization in news coverage is real, but it is not constant. It emerges from a process shaped by timing, competition, and institutional norms. At moments of crisis, convergence dominates. As those moments pass, divergence returns.

This helps explain why cable news can appear both unified and divided, depending on when it is observed. Analysts focusing on breaking news may see convergence, while those examining longer-term coverage may see persistent polarization.

Both perspectives capture part of the story—but neither captures all of it.

The bottom line

Cable news is not simply polarized or unified. It is both, depending on when you look. We show that what appears to be a deeply divided media system is, in practice, one that moves between convergence and divergence in response to events, competition, and journalistic norms. In short, cable news is not a collection of isolated echo chambers. It is a strategically responsive system—one in which the boundaries of journalism, competition, and ideology are constantly being renegotiated in real time.

• This article is based on the paper, “News of Converging Crises: Cable Coverage of Race and COVID Stories” in Political Research Quarterly.
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• Note: This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of USAPP – American Politics and Policy, nor the London School of Economics.

The post Cable news drops the partisan script during major events, at least for a time first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

Published in July 2025, The White House’s America’s AI Action Plan opens with the statement that “The United States is in a race to achieve global dominance in artificial intelligence”, rhetoric which has been mirrored by other recent statements from the Trump administration. While the idea of an “AI race” has gained popularity, we argue that these narratives about the global “AI race” and “technological innovation” miss a crucial point: innovation and competition are not inherently beneficial, nor are they sufficient for sustainable progress on their own. At the same time, regulation does not necessarily block or hamper innovation; rather, it can stimulate and help steer it toward outcomes that are safe, trustworthy, and socially valuable. Framing AI as a race and promoting a zeal for winning it ultimately comes at the expense of local communities where AI infrastructure is built, accelerated environmental degradation driven by steep energy and water consumption, and deregulation which will pose risks to individuals and various social groups including minors.

The “AI race” narrative in the US

On December 11, 2025, President Trump signed the executive order, “Ensuring A National Policy Framework For Artificial Intelligence” to pre-empt US state AI laws. When signing the order, a reporter asked the president: “Are you more worried about the US winning the race for AI dominance with China, or about AI’s potential threat to humanity?” The president responded, “both, we’re looking at it very strongly, we have a lot of threats in the opposite way if we don’t do it [investing in AI and banning states from regulating it] … Look, we’re leading China by a lot, China knows that, and not doing this would be the greatest gift to China and other countries, but China in particular.”

For some time now, Washington has been framing AI policy in terms of “the race against China”.Some experts have suggested that the race narrative is the pretext to justify deregulation and indulge AI companies with favourable conditions, ultimately to build more AI infrastructure in the US and retain control of crucial resources. Proponents of the race narrative suggest that, just as the US won the internet race in the 1990s, the rule for AI should once again be to “move fast and break things.” But at this point it is clear that AI can break far more than the internet ever could. Furthermore, unlike AI, the internet itself, is only the conduit for data, and does not create new content and material nor pose potential existential threats to humanity.

The US AI Action Plan published in July 2025 notes that “winning the AI race” will create a new golden age of prosperity and freedom. But as the Yale Law scholar, Gilad Abiri notes, a race without guardrails produces shared vulnerability, not strength. Abiri offers three reasons why AI deregulation is built on illusion: First, dropping oversight does not secure lasting technological dominance because AI capabilities spread rapidly, making it irrational to sacrifice long-term safety for short-term speed. Second, fewer rules do not mean faster innovation. It is through clear standards and predictable liability that progress and investment are accelerated. Third, deregulation undermines national security, because it arms adversaries with better tools for information warfare.

China rejects the AI race narrative

The race mentality promoted in the US omits the fact that China is not developing its AI strategy under a “race” framing. Indeed, the race narrative has been rejected by Chinese politicians and business leaders, who seem more interested in the adoption and concrete applications of AI than in a “race” against the US.

Currently, Chinese policymakers are taking a measured stance and are leading global efforts to regulate AI. For example, during the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in July 2025, Chinese Premier Li Qiang warned that AI could become “an exclusive game for a few countries and companies,” urging global cooperation instead of reckless competition. Even Chinese state outlets like the Global Times have emphasized the significance of “judicial rulings and comprehensive regulatory oversight” to promote a healthy development. In fact, the Chinese are going beyond rhetoric, as reflected in their concrete steps (e.g., mandating providers that conduct sensitive research to establish a science and technology ethics review committee) toward more robust ethics and safety standards, cybersecurity, copyright, privacy, and transparency.

For China, the question does not seem to be about who gets there first; it’s who gets there safely and sustainably. Even Chinese business leaders are rejecting the race framing. For example, Alibaba’s Joe Tsai recently stressed: “There’s no such thing as winning the race. It’s a long marathon. My definition of winning is not who builds the strongest model, but who adopts it better.” This is a crucial distinction. A sprint might produce flashy headlines and massive investment surges (some of which may never yield the expected return on investments), but without adoption, which requires regulation and, especially trust, innovation cannot result in real progress and improvement in human flourishing.

As Time magazine reported last August, Chinese officials have described AI governance in simple but powerful terms: “If the braking system isn’t under control, you can’t step on the accelerator with confidence.” That’s not a call for slowing down and suggests a recognition that control is what allows sustainable speed and proceeding safely. Indeed, while the US emphasizes dominance and deregulation, China’s approach stresses collaboration, and long-term governance, as reflected in its Global AI Governance Action Plan, put forward in July 2025 as a contribution to UN-led processes such as the Global Dialogue on AI Governance.

Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash

The need for local and global AI regulation and to move away from the race narrative

AI innovations may advance aspects of human life, provided they are subject to appropriate regulation and implemented in ways that reflect the diverse priorities and vulnerabilities of different communities. However, when signing the American AI Action Plan on July 23, 2025, President Trump stressed the need for “a single federal standard, not 50 different states regulating this industry of the future…You can’t have one State holding you up, you can’t have three or four States holding you up. You can’t have a state with standards that are so high that it’s going to hold you up.”

We believe that variations at the state or regional level drive innovation in governance itself and can give companies and communities options to negotiate. Instead of uniformity, coordination and meaningful convergence are needed as legal frameworks are tested and mature. To ensure interoperability and lower trade barriers, regulations need to converge federally as well as internationally, but that should not eliminate local or state-level laws.

When considering the indispensability of regulations, it is reasonable to argue that technological innovation counts as progress only when it expands human flourishing. AI systems that harm, deceive, or destabilize societies through increased inequality or national security threats, cannot meet that definition regardless of how “innovative” they are. Some politicians have argued that regulation will stifle innovation, but history of science and technology suggests the opposite: safety standards, ethics review boards, and regulations to enforce accountabilities have made innovations more trusted, more adoptable, and ultimately more successful. A recent report by IBM shows surveyed “executives crediting more than a quarter (27 percent) of their efficiency gains to strong governance”, while “companies that invest more in AI ethics report 34 percent higher profit from AI as well as faster launches and stronger security.” The report goes on to argue that “perhaps unexpectedly, AI governance—often viewed as an innovation-hampering hurdle . . . —has emerged as a decisive factor in delivering business impact and business outcomes.”

Even polls have demonstrated general support for AI regulations. For example, recent survey results from the Pew Research Center suggest that the American public also want greater control over how AI is used in their lives and worry that it could weaken creativity and human connection. Likewise, a Gallup survey published in September 2025 found that 97 percent of Americans believe AI safety and security require regulation (although they disagree on who should regulate it). Given reports and lawsuits related to AI-induced suicide cases, sexualized images of real people, and the negative impacts of AI-generated misinformation on the media ecosystem and crisis management, public support for stronger regulation is unsurprising and reflects a growing awareness of AI risks. However, the political landscape in the US seems uninterested or unable to take the lead in regulating AI at a federal and international level. While the American AI Action Plan is regulatory action in a procedural sense, as it articulates federal policy priorities, substantively it advances a deregulatory agenda through reducing compliance burdens and limiting oversight.

The real question is not who wins the race, but who builds AI systems that people can trust. If nothing, state-level regulation could stop AI companies from taking advantage of local vulnerabilities (e.g., affordable land and energy prices) and prevent them from benefitting from regulatory loopholes, thereby safeguarding local communities, and reducing the risk of a race to the bottom in oversight and enforcement. Instead of approaching AI policy as a zero-sum game that only benefits the few who control the technology, we should advocate for AI innovation that benefits society at large.

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The post Rather than framing AI competition as a “race” with China, to drive innovation the US should promote greater local and global AI regulation first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

Over the past decade, millions of Americans have turned to gig platforms like Uber, DoorDash, and TaskRabbit for income. Gig work offers flexibility and independence, but it also brings instability. Because gig workers aren’t considered traditional employees, they’re excluded from much of the US social safety net: benefits like employer-sponsored health insurance, unemployment insurance, and paid leave.

Despite this growing trend, we still know relatively little about how gig workers think about government and public policy. Do they support expanding social protections? How engaged are they in politics? Our new research which surveyed more than 1,500 service-sector and gig workers in early 2023, had both surprising and revealing findings. Far from being politically disengaged, many gig workers show strong support for expanding social protections and are politically active, especially in non-traditional ways.

Not all gig work is the same

To understand the politics of gig work, we need to start by recognizing that not all gig workers are the same. Some people turn to gig platforms as a primary job; others use them to supplement income from a more traditional job. We call the first group “main job” gig workers, and the second group “side job” gig workers.

This distinction matters. Main-job gig workers tend to face more economic uncertainty. They are less likely to have access to employer-provided health insurance, retirement benefits, or paid leave. In fact, our data show that these workers are largely excluded from the more generous layers of the American safety net. Side-job gig workers, by contrast, are in a different situation. Many of them do have access to traditional benefits through their main job, often meaning that they are less affected by the precarity of their side job.

Support for more inclusive policies and reclassification

Despite differences in access to benefits, both main-job and side-job gig workers showed strong support for expanding government programs to cover nonstandard workers. This shared support is striking given how different their material circumstances are. One possible explanation is that their common experience of working outside the traditional employer-employee relationship shapes similar attitudes toward the safety net.

This shared experience may also explain their support for reclassification efforts, which could expand their access to key protections. In the US, the employment status of gig workers remains unsettled. Are they truly independent contractors, or should they be considered employees? Efforts to clarify this, such as the Biden administration’s proposed rule in 2022, have faced fierce pushback (the proposed Biden rule was challenged in court and ultimately blocked under the second Trump administration). Other countries, including Spain and Italy, have taken more definitive steps to reclassify some gig workers as employees. These legal ambiguities can influence how gig workers see themselves and what kinds of policies they support.

Gig workers showed relatively strong support for the proposed Biden rule, which could have entitled them to minimum wage, overtime pay, and other protections. This support, however, exists alongside a strong desire for flexibility. In fact, 68 percent of main-job gig workers in our survey said that “the freedom this work offers” was a major reason they pursued it. This suggests that many gig workers are navigating a trade-off: they value flexibility but also recognize the risks and want better protections.

Political engagement: beyond the ballot

One of our most surprising findings is that main-job gig workers are less likely to vote than traditional workers but are more likely to participate in other forms of political activity, like protests or contacting elected officials. This pattern aligns with other research: people in precarious economic situations may be less likely to vote, which is not targeted to particular policy problems, but more inclined toward expressive political acts like demonstrations.

This isn’t just an American story. A recent study of European workers found that occupational precarity is linked to higher protest activity. Gig workers, often on the margins of traditional employment, are becoming a new kind of political actor who doesn’t always show up at the ballot box, but still makes their voice heard.

Photo by Robert Anasch on Unsplash

What this means for policy and politics

Our findings suggest that the gig economy is reshaping how people work, while also influencing how many workers think about government, social protections, and political participation.

This has important policy implications. As traditional full-time employment becomes less common, labour protections that are tightly tied to employer-employee relationships may leave a growing numbers of workers exposed. Policies that expand access to benefits regardless of employment classification, such as portable benefits or income-based unemployment insurance, may be better suited to this new world of work.

There are also lessons for political campaigns and parties. To date, US political parties have largely failed to recognize gig workers, along with the broader category of self-employed and nonstandard workers, as a distinct and growing constituency. This is a missed opportunity for political parties, especially Democrats, to engage with a growing and economically vulnerable segment of the workforce. After Democrats struggled to mobilize key groups like Hispanic men in the 2024 presidential election, greater attention to the economic insecurities and policy concerns of nonstandard workers could help broaden their electoral appeal.

In short, the gig economy may be giving rise to a new kind of political constituency that values flexibility, faces heightened economic risk, and expresses strong support for a more inclusive safety net. Gig workers are not simply passive recipients of labour market change; they are actively forming attitudes and engaging in politics in ways that reflect their lived experiences. Understanding this group will be essential for designing both policies and political strategies that are responsive to the future of work.

• This article is based on the paper, “The Safety Net and the Gig Economy: Policy Attitudes and Political Participation”, in Perspectives on Politics.
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The post The gig economy is reshaping how people work – and what they think about social protections and politics first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

As the United States becomes increasingly diverse, a central question for American democracy remains: do elected officials respond equally to all constituents? Or does race shape whose voices are heard? In new research we examine how state legislators respond to constituents from different racial and ethnic backgrounds. Our findings reveal a striking pattern: while legislators do not discriminate against Black constituents relative to white constituents, Latino constituents receive significantly fewer responses from their elected representatives. This pattern is driven largely by white legislators. These results complicate common assumptions about representation in a diversifying America.

Testing legislators’ responsiveness to race

To assess how race shapes responsiveness, in January 2020 we conducted an audit experiment involving more than 7,000 state legislators across 49 states (excluding Nebraska’s nonpartisan unicameral legislature). Each legislator received an email from a fictitious constituent requesting information about internships, campaign work, or political involvement. The emails varied only in the apparent racial identity of the sender. Legislators were randomly assigned to receive a message from a constituent with a name commonly associated with one of three groups: a white name (such as Jake Anderson), a Black name (such as Jamal Jackson), or a Latino name (such as José García). The message text included a brief reference to the sender’s racial or ethnic identity to make the cue explicit. Importantly, the assumed constituent’s partisanship was matched to that of the legislator to rule out the possibility that legislators were inferring partisanship from racial cues.

The outcome we were interested in was simple: whether the legislator replied to the email. In total, more than 5,900 emails were successfully delivered to legislators and their offices. Across all legislators, we find no evidence that Black constituents receive fewer responses than white constituents. In fact, legislators reply to Black and white constituents at roughly similar rates. Latino constituents, however, receive fewer responses than both groups.

A common argument in political science is that electing more minority officials improves representation for minority communities—what we call descriptive representation. To evaluate this possibility, we examined whether legislators respond differently depending on their own racial identity. We find that Black legislators do not appear to respond differently to constituents of different racial backgrounds. They respond to Black, Latino, and white constituents at roughly similar rates. Importantly, the absence of a “coethnic advantage” for Black constituents stems partly from a surprising result: white legislators also respond to Black constituents at roughly the same rate as white constituents.

The pattern looks somewhat different for Latino legislators, although the number of Latino legislators in state legislatures is relatively small. Latino legislators appear somewhat more responsive to Latino constituents than to white constituents, though the difference is not statistically significant due to the smaller sample size. However, the broader results show that white legislators respond less frequently to Latino constituents than to both white and Black constituents. Taken together, these results suggest that increasing Latino representation could reduce disparities in responsiveness—not necessarily because Latino legislators respond much more to Latino constituents, but because it reduces exposure to patterns of under-response among white legislators.

Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash

When there are fewer Latino and Black constituents, white legislators are less responsive to them

We also examined whether responsiveness varies depending on the racial composition of legislators’ districts. The results show a clear pattern. White legislators indistricts with fewer Latino residents respond significantly less often to Latino constituents. In districts with larger Latino populations, this disparity largely disappears. A similar pattern emerges for Black constituents: white legislators in districts with larger Black populations respond more frequently to Black constituents than do legislators in districts with smaller Black populations.

Two possible mechanisms may help explain these patterns. First, intrinsic motivations may play a role, as districts with larger racial minority populations may select legislators whose attitudes make them less likely to racially discriminate. Second, strategic incentives may also matter. Legislators representing racially diverse districts may have stronger incentives to cultivate support from minority voters, which could encourage more equal responsiveness. Importantly, we find no evidence supporting the idea that larger minority populations trigger a “racial threat” response among white legislators. Instead, greater diversity appears associated with more equal patterns of responsiveness.

Why differences in responsiveness to constituents matters

These findings highlight an often-overlooked dimension of representation. While debates about political representation frequently focus on elections and legislative behavior, everyday interactions between constituents and elected officials are also an important part of democratic governance. Responding to constituent requests—whether about internships, community engagement, or public services—is one of the most basic ways elected officials interact with the public. Differences in responsiveness therefore matter for who receives access, information, and assistance from government.

Our findings suggest that disparities in responsiveness remain present, particularly for Latino constituents. At the same time, they also show that these disparities are not uniform across racial groups and are shaped by both institutional and demographic contexts. As the United States continues to diversify, understanding how elected officials respond to constituents from different communities will remain a crucial question for American democracy.

• This article is based on the paper, “Responsiveness to Coethnics and Cominorities: Evidence from an Audit Experiment of State Legislators”, in The Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics.
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The post White state legislators are less responsive to Latinos compared to their Black and white constituents first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

In the far northwest of New York City’s northernmost borough, the Bronx, just south of Van Cortlandt Park, the site of Revolutionary War battles, is the Amalgamated Housing Cooperative. It’s due to celebrate its centenary next year, making it the oldest surviving co-op of its kind in the US. It is one of 11 housing cooperatives dotted around the city, built between 1927 and the early 1970s, comprising 32,903 homes for people with moderate incomes, inspired and sponsored by NYC’s labor unions, particularly those organized in the clothing industry.

Abraham Kazan and New York City housing cooperatives

The Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America (ACWA) gave its name to the groundbreaking Bronx Co-op and worked closely with the International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILGWU). Overwhelmingly, the pioneer “cooperators” (as they liked to be called) were first- and second-generation Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. Through their numerous political, social and cultural organisations, they galvanised a radicalisation of NYC politics that could be compared with the recent election of Zohran Mamdani. The ACWA and ILGWU developed a form of welfare trade unionism that produced health, banking and insurance services for their members, as well as cooperative housing and holiday resorts.

Amalgamated housing Co-op in the Bronx. Photo credit: Glyn Robbins

As with Mamdani’s supporters, housing was central to the concerns of the thousands condemned to slum tenements, unaffordable rents and the constant threat of eviction in early 20^th century NYC, many of them living in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Among them was Abraham Kazan (1888 – 1971), who passed through Ellis Island in 1904, having made the difficult journey from his home in the small town of Germanovka, fifty miles south-west of Kiev.

Kazan first tried to settle in the Lower East Side, off Grand Street, living in a cramped apartment with relatives. A nearby street now bears his name. But work and decent housing were hard to find, so he moved to one of the scores of agricultural colonies established by and for Jewish people in southern New Jersey. It was here that Kazan began to develop the ideas that would lead to him becoming the driving force of NYC housing Co-ops.

Kazan adopted an eclectic philosophy, combining anarchism, socialism and entrepreneurialism. Like many of his contemporaries and counterparts, he was not an observant, religious Jew, but his Jewish identity was important to him, particularly the radicalism that developed around his mother-tongue, Yiddish. But above all, Kazan was a convert to cooperativism, directly inspired by the UK’s Rochdale Pioneers and the movement, also linked to the textile industry, that was born in 1844 in the Lancashire mill town’s Toad Lane.

With a talent for administration and partnership building, from the mid-1920s, when he was working for the ACWA, Kazan began assembling the political connections, funding and land he needed for his first housing Co-op. The northern Bronx was virtually undeveloped until the arrival of the subway system in 1905 and land was still relatively cheap. But the borough was also becoming a sought-after suburban destination for Lower East Side Jews. This aspiration was captured in some of the first words spoken on film, when Al Jolson turns to his mother in “The Jazz Singer” (released in 1927, the same year people started moving into the Bronx Amalgamated Co-op) and says “Mama darling, if I’m a success in this show, well, we’re going to move from here. Oh yes, we’re move up in to Bronx”.

The growth and legacy of NYC housing co-ops

The success of Kazan’s first project spurred the second, the Amalgamated Dwellings, back in the Lower East Side. The development had similar design qualities to its Bronx relative, with generous landscaped gardens and spacious, light, ventilated apartments. Kazan also prioritised the provision of shopping, welfare and social facilities within the Co-ops, part of his vision of building a cooperative community, not just a block of apartments.

The key to Kazan’s model is the principle that the homes he helped build could not be bought or sold on the open market for personal profit. Cooperators made a one-off lumpsum payment to secure ownership of their apartment, followed by a monthly “carrying charge” for the various services they received, including repairs, caretaking and maintenance. If they chose to leave the Co-op, their lumpsum would be repaid and their apartment returned to the Co-op for the next person on the waiting list.

This has remained the practice for the 28,460 NYC homes that have retained Kazan’s cooperative principles. Sadly, four of the original developments (comprising 4,443 apartments) chose to cease being limited equity Co-ops in the 1990s. Significantly, they are all in the rapidly gentrifying Lower East Side and buying a home in one of them would cost around one million dollars, a situation one of Kazan’s contemporaries said would have had him “turning in his grave”.

Kazan’s ability to forge alliances was exemplified by his unlikely relationship with Robert Moses, the “master builder” of 20^th century New York City. The two men had some things in common. They were born within three days of each other, dominated their fields for decades and shared an unshakable belief in their own rightness. In Moses’ case, this included an arrogant disregard for the working-class communities he bulldozed out of the way for his mega projects. People of colour were often the disproportionate victims of his ruthlessness. To some extent, similar criticisms can be made of Kazan, albeit it in the historic context of racism being hard-wired into US housing policy.

Rochdale Village, Photo credit: Glyn Robbins

Kazan went some way to addressing these injustices, if not quite atoning for them. Under the auspices of the United Housing Foundation (UHF), a union-backed organization he created in 1951, he oversaw the development of ever-bigger cooperatives. Rochdale Village in Queens (5,850 homes, completed in 1966) was explicitly intended to foster racial integration, during the height of the civil rights movement. It remains known as the biggest African American housing Co-op in the world. But Rochdale Village is dwarfed by Co-Op City in the north-east Bronx, completed in 1973, after a tortuous construction programme, where today, an ethnically mixed community of approximately 50,000 people live in 15,372 apartments.

Co-Op city, Photo credit: Glyn Robbins

Kazan died two years before Co-City’s completion, probably a blessing given the multiple problems that followed, including the longest rent strike in US history. But despite mostly avoiding public recognition, the significance of his work was marked on 19^th May 1962 when President Kennedy attended the opening of the UHF’s Penn South Co-op. The 2,820-home complex in the Chelsea neighbourhood is perhaps the most faithful expression of Kazan’s ideals. It remains a vibrant cooperative community, successfully resisting the tides of property speculation that swirl around it, providing secure homes where people can build a life, while paying at least a third less than it would cost to rent in the city’s hyper exploitative private market. Penn South also has an important place in US history because it was the long-time home of civil rights leader Bayard Rustin, whose apartment sometimes played host to Bob Dylan and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when he and Rustin were planning the 1963 March on Washington.

Lessons for Zohran Mamdani

Penn South embodies the divergent paths that NYC housing could follow in the age of Mamdani. While the new mayor has expressed his ambition to tackle “affordability”, it remains to be seen to what extent he can actually do this, while the real estate lobby and its political allies retain control of what gets built. To succeed, Mamdani will need to adopt some of the boldness of Kazan.

In the mid. 1960s, Kazan wanted to build another housing Co-op at Coney Island, Brooklyn. The land he wanted to use was also coveted by a local private developer, one Fred C. Trump. A bitter legal and political battle ensued, resulting in a more-or-less equal division of the spoils, and the UHF building the 2,585-apartment Amalgamated Warbasse cooperative. Kazan recalled dealing with Trump as the “dirtiest” experience of his career. But if Zohran Mamdani is to succeed, he will need to be similarly prepared to challenge Fred Trump’s son and the system which, as Kazan observed, is set up to maximise private profit over social need.

• Glyn Robbins’ biography of Abraham Kazan will be published by Cornell University Press in 2027. Glyn will be speaking about “The Co-Op Builders” at an event at The People’s Forum in Manhattan on 2^nd April, details here THE CO-OP BUILDERS: A Panel Discussion Tickets, Thursday, Apr 2 from 7 pm to 8:30 pm | Eventbrite.
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• Note: This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of USAPP – American Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics. 

The post The hidden history of New York City housing co-ops first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.

In 2008, political scientists Alan I. Abramowitz and Kyle L. Saunders wrote the influential paper, “Is Polarization a Myth?” Since then, a growing body of work has shown that political polarisation in the United States is real and has been increasing over time. We see the effects of this polarization daily as political divisions increasingly shape everyday life in the United States. Democrats and Republicans not only vote for different parties and support different policies, but also watch different television programmes, shop in different places, and even choose different books for their children. Our research shows that this divide extends to a less visible but highly consequential area: the creation of new technologies and the way those technologies spread.

What political affiliation means for invention

To investigate the influence of polarisation on invention we assembled a new dataset linking US inventors from 2001 to 2023 to voter files from four large, highly innovative states: Florida, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. In the United States, voter registration records often include party affiliation, allowing us to observe inventors’ political affiliation directly. In these four states, inventors are split approximately evenly among Democrats, Republicans, and those who are either unaffiliated or registered with a third party.

We focus on three areas of technology in which partisan disagreement is especially pronounced: climate change mitigation, including cleaner energy and emissions-reducing technologies; women’s reproductive health, including contraception and related health technologies; and weapon-related technologies. These are socially and economically important domains in which partisan differences are especially pronounced.

We found that compared with Republican inventors, inventors affiliated with the Democratic Party are about one-third more likely to patent green or women’s health technologies, and about one-third less likely to patent weapons and related technologies. These differences closely mirror partisan differences in public opinion on the same issues. For example, a 30 per cent gap between Democrats and Republicans in support for urgent action on climate change corresponds to about a 30 per cent gap in the likelihood of patenting green technologies.

Inventors’ values are important

These gaps are not simply explained by differences in skill or workplace setting. They remain visible among similarly successful inventors, within narrowly defined technology areas, and even within the same organisations. They also show up where inventors are likely to have more freedom over what they work on, such as academia and solo-inventor patents. This suggests that inventors are motivated not only by financial returns, but also by whether a technology fits with their values or beliefs. Similar patterns have been documented in other professions: some physicians, for example, decline to provide certain reproductive services even when compensation is available, because they object on moral or religious grounds.

The partisan divide in innovation has widened since the early 2000s, a period marked by rising political polarisation. By 2015, the gap between Democratic and Republican inventors had doubled in green technologies and women’s health and widened even more in weapon-related technologies. This increase is driven both by new inventors and by those already active in earlier years, suggesting that the divide reflects both who enters these fields and how inventors shift their work over their careers.

“Silicon Valley USPTO (United States Patent and Trademark Office) Building Logo, San Jose, California” by Will Buckner, CC BY 2.0

Inventors’ party affiliation also shapes how ideas spread. Looking at patent citations – that is, which earlier inventions later inventors build on – we find that Democrats are more likely than Republicans to cite green and women’s health technologies, and less likely to cite weapon-related technologies. Part of this may reflect the fact that people are more likely to interact with others who are politically similar to them. But we find that the content of the technologies matters too: inventors are more likely to build on ideas that align with their views.

Political polarisation is shaping who innovates what and where

Economists often treat innovation as a response to financial rewards, regulation, and market demand. Those forces clearly matter, but they are not the whole story. If inventors also care about whether a technology aligns with their values or political beliefs, then shifts in social and political views may shape innovation not only through shifts in consumer demand, but also through the technologies that inventors are willing to work on. These effects may persist over time, as today’s inventions shape the questions future innovators ask and the ideas they choose to build on. If political polarisation changes what gets invented today, it may also influence which kinds of technologies are developed in the future and, with that, who benefits from technological progress.

More broadly, our findings highlight a new channel linking politics and innovation. Recent discussions have focused on the idea that technological change contributes to social and political polarisation. Our findings suggest that the relationship may also run in the other direction. Political polarisation and the evolution of society’s views on important issues are not only consequences of technological change; they can also shape which technologies are developed.

• The article is based on the CEP discussion paper, No 2116 Polarized Technologies.
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The post Polarization is not a myth: it is reflected in the creation and spread of new technologies first appeared on LSE United States Politics and Policy.