Political polarisation of climate-policy-relevant attitudes: Longitudinal evidence from Britain

Abstract

This article provides a longitudinal study of political polarisation of climate-policy-relevant attitudes in Britain, 2014–2025. It shows that, in a context of increased climate salience, Britons’ climate-policy-relevant attitudes have become much more strongly associated with party support (partisan polarisation) and with other political attitudes (ideological polarisation). Consistent with findings from other West European countries, partisan polarisation is driven particularly by the growing number and increasing attitudinal distinctiveness of right-populist party supporters, while ideological polarisation occurs mainly along the cultural dimension. The article assesses individual-level polarisation mechanisms using cross-lagged panel models. Results suggest that, notwithstanding temporal fluctuation in estimated effects, both party-based attitude change and attitude-based sorting contribute to partisan polarisation. However, additional analysis suggests that ideology-based attitude change – whereby climate-policy-relevant attitudes and right-populist support both align increasingly with voters’ prior cultural attitudes – contributes substantially to both cultural ideological polarisation and partisan polarisation of climate-policy-relevant attitudes.