Social Polarization Research Articles

Social inequality and residential segregation trends in Spanish global cities. A comparative analysis of Madrid, Barcelona, and Valencia (2001-2021)

Over the last three decades, the most populated Spanish cities have experienced significant spatial, social, and economic changes. The new urban economies have played an essential role in the acceleration of such transformations, entailing a range of both positive and negative impacts at the spatial, social, economic, and environmental levels. This paper presents a quantitative analysis of how the advancement of the globalization and deindustrialization processes has encouraged social polarization in the cities of Madrid, Barcelona, and Valencia, as well as a significant increase in intra-urban socioeconomic residential segregation. The article concludes by arguing that the increase in levels of social inequality and residential segregation reflects the trend towards polarized urban models, which reproduce in urban space the differences observed in the social structure.

Social Impact of South Korea’s Economic Polarization in the 21st Century

Polarization has gained popularity as a pivotal lexicon to understand modern society. The rich and poor gap has been excessively widening to the point where the low and middle classes believe the effort is meaningless. Despite polarization being a global concern, this essay shall examine South Korea’s economic polarization and its social impact. Specifically, the essay spotlights the potential causes of extreme discrepancy between the high-class and low-middle class, alongside social division. The gist of this piece is to propose that economic disparities in classes have resulted in social polarization. The essay shall be structured into three sections. First, I analyze the possible causes of economic polarization. Second, this part delineates how economic polarization has been manifested in South Korea. Third, the social impact of such disparity will be analyzed. These sections suggest that aggravated economic polarization significantly dwindles the low and low-middle classes to self-actualize.

Platform urbanisation, infrastructures and techno-politics: The turn towards urban citizenship

This article analyses how digital platforms challenge and redefine the way in which urban forms of citizenship are shaped. What we call ‘platform urbanisation’ accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic when digital platforms penetrated with increasing rapidity into every aspect of urban life. While these digital platforms have facilitated new possibilities for engagement, access to services, efficiency in processing data, and customising responses to people online and offline, they also pose political challenges related to inequality, privacy, exclusion and social polarisation. Developing a techno-political urban environment built upon inclusion, equality, and respect for the rights of users, necessitates leveraging the potential of digital platforms to empower citizens and acknowledging and incorporating the political nature of this new urban environment. Furthermore, the intersection between the political influence of platforms on the governance of citizens and everyday life has a biopolitical dimension, since the power of platforms is exercised through policies and practices that affect individuals and collectivities. The article clarifies two essential facets of platform urbanisation: (1) the political nature of such a process, which requires a reframing of citizenship and (2) the role of both material and immaterial infrastructures in this process, which serve thus to constitute it as a new biopolitical territory. This conceptual expansion allows us to interpret digital platforms as an inextricable merging of political rationality, administrative techniques and technology.

Landscapes of boom and ruination: politics of seeing in China’s “tin capital” Gejiu, 1912-1949

This article argues that landscapes of ruination and wasted labour are not an unfortunate finale in the history of mineral-rich cities under the “resource curse” but an always ongoing reality from the start of their involvement in the capitalist world market and pursuit of industrial modernity. Focusing on narratives about the “tin capital” Gejiu in southwestern China during the first half of the 20th century, I conduct a historical analysis and examine how geological and sociological experts introduced new politics of seeing and exploiting land and labour. Boasting the landscape of the industrial boom, Chinese intellectuals and technobureaucrats alike considered geological discoveries and resource extraction as a sign of a nation’s civilizational status and modernization achievements. Their fascination with this outlying small town also exemplified a nationalist claim to the new Republican State’s southwestern borderlands in an era of imperialist territorial divisions. Nonetheless, they had to constantly explain (away) appalling sights of environmental ruination and social polarization, often through promises of mechanization or labour welfare. Offering a close reading of travelogues, social surveys and scientific reports, I challenge the conventional narrative from prosperity to decline and reveal landscapes of ruination at the heart of modernization and nationalist discourse of conquering and utilizing natural resources.

Impact of global events on crude oil economy: a comprehensive review of the geopolitics of energy and economic polarization

Impact of global events on crude oil economy: a comprehensive review of the geopolitics of energy and economic polarization

POLARIZATION AND INTERVENTION-BASED P/CVE PROGRAMS IN CANADA

On November 13th, 2023, Dr. Sara K. Thompson presented Polarization and Intervention-based P/CVE Programs in Canada for this year’s West Coast Security Conference. The key points discussed were the typology of extremist violence, the processes of radicalization and mobilization to violence, the threat landscape in Canada, past and present (and the impact of social polarization), and the somewhat recent incorporation of prevention/intervention programming into the broader national security apparatus.
 
 Received: 12-12-2023
 Revised: 01-29-2024

When Moral Talk Becomes Profitable

Should businesses engage in moral talk when it becomes profitable? Due to their particular position of visibility, it is reasonable to acknowledge that businesses have specific moral duties. Some might argue that companies ought to help abandon morally repugnant norms by providing examples of alternative behaviors through advertisements. However, the moral talk of businesses might unexpectedly reinforce repugnant norms and increase social tensions in a polarized society. Then, the duty of the companies is not fulfilled when they engage in moral talk. In polarized societies, the positional duty of businesses implies decreasing the risk of social conflict. It is not clear how to do that, yet I argue that if businesses use moral talk with mass marketing strategies, they would strive to shape impartial moral messages aiming to find points of moral convergence among polarized moral positions, which might mitigate social polarization. I call this duty the imperative of doux commerce.

Diving into the divide: a systematic review of cognitive bias-based polarization on social media

PurposeThe global prevalence of social media and its potential to cause polarization are highly debated and impactful. The previous literature often assumes that the ideological bias of any media outlet remains static and exogenous to the polarization process. By studying polarization as a whole from an ecosystem approach, the authors aim to identify policies and strategies that can help mitigate the adverse effects of polarization and promote healthier online discourse.Design/methodology/approachTo investigate online polarization, the authors perform a systematic review and analysis of approximately 400 research articles to explore the connection between cognitive bias and polarization, examining both causal and correlational evidence. The authors extensively evaluate and integrate existing research related to the correlation between online polarization and crucial factors such as public engagement, selective exposure and political democracy. From doing so, the authors then develop a PolarSphere ecosystem that captures and illustrates the process of online polarization formation.FindingsThe authors' review uncovers a wide range of associations, including ideological cognition, bias, public participation, misinformation and miscommunication, political democracy, echo chambers and selective exposure, heterogeneity and trust. Although the impact of bias on social media polarization depends on specific environments and internal/external conditions, certain variables exhibit strong associations across multiple contexts. The authors use these observations as a basis from which to construct PolarSphere, an ecosystem of bias-based polarization on social media, to theorize the process of polarization formation.Originality/valueBased on the PolarSphere ecosystem, the authors argue that it is crucial for governments and civil societies to maintain vigilance and invest in further research to gain a deep comprehension of how cognitive bias affects online polarization, which could lead to ways to eliminate polarization.

The Rise of Invisible Economy and its Philosophical Reflection

Since the new century, the progress of science and technology and the rational transformation of its achievements have brought about the rapid rise of intangible economy. The knowledge-based, image-based, programmatic, and branded nature of capital, as well as the spillover, sharing, and unstable ownership of products, are its prominent features. The rise of intangible economy has overturned the traditional economic operation mode in various fields such as economic structure, industrial pattern, organizational mode, and labor form, and has also triggered philosophical thinking about this new economic paradigm: data elements have become the first production factor with ontological significance, and the elasticity of labor mode has brought about the spiritual illusion of free and autonomous labor, and social polarization is rapidly intensifying.

Researching Media and Democracy Researchers: Monitoring Capabilities in Poland

In this article, we look at the conditions of media and democracy discourses in Poland via the lenses of monitoring time-related capabilities. We are interested in how media–societal change in 2000–2020 has influenced the Polish researchers’ responses to deliver applied research and further foster hyper-knowledge sharing between policymakers, media industries, and academia. Through an in-depth investigation of Poland’s media researchers’ publications database (<em>N</em> = 1,000), we aim to examine the crucial interest areas considering the critical cultural junctures in three highly related areas: technology, politics, and society. The critical junctures theory review follows the mapping of changes in related scholarly analyses to uncover three sides of Polish scholarship monitoring capabilities alongside cultural conditions of researchers’ impact on democracy and the media. The overall hypothesis is that examining media and democracy in Poland reflects technological and political change, with the cultural research path dependencies in analyzing broader social context (see, for instance, a young democracy, illiberal turns and social polarization conditions, and so on). This corresponds to related tensions between the Western media’s theories and practices concerning democracy.

On the impossibility of breaking the echo chamber effect in social media using regulation

As scientists, we are proud of our role in developing the current digital age that enables billions of people to communicate rapidly with others via social media. However, when things go wrong, we are also responsible for taking an ethical stand and trying to solve problems, and this work aims to take a step in this direction. Our goal is to set the foundation for a mathematically formal study of how we might regulate social media and, in particular, address the problem of the echo chamber effect. An echo chamber is a closed system where other voices are excluded by omission, causing your beliefs to become amplified or reinforced. In turn, these bubbles can boost social polarization and extreme political views, and, unfortunately, there is strong evidence that echo chambers exist in social media. The fundamental question we try to answer is: how and can a regulation “break” or reduce the echo chamber effect in social media? Sadly, the paper’s main result is an impossibility result: a general regulation function that achieves this goal (on our social media model) while obeying the core values of democratic societies (freedom of expression and user privacy) does not exist. This result leaves us with hard future choices to make.

Opposition in Four Directions The Fragmentation and Polarization of Todays American Democratic Politics

With Donald Trump's defeat in the presidential election, America's right-wing populist and non-establishment political leader lost his former glory and was replaced by Joe Biden, who supported multiculturalism and the establishment. However, the end of the general election does not mean the end of the conflict and struggle between the four directions of right-wing populism and multiculturalism, non-establishment camp and establishment camp. The opposition in these four directions makes the dilemma of today's American democratic politics clear. The phenomenon of social division and political polarization deserves attention, and the study of the background and impact of the conflict can help analyze the social problems existing in the United States. The struggle between the left and the right and the establishment complexly exists between the two parties, triggering a series of chain reactions such as Hillary's defeat, Trump's political moves and the "Capitol Hill" incident, and further intensifying the intensity of the struggle. Relevant concepts about struggle will be elaborated, the historical factors of struggle will be traced, and its profound and widespread impact on American society will be analyzed.

How to get angry online…properly: Creating online deliberative systems that harness political anger's power and mitigate its costs

Under conditions of high social and political polarization, expressing political anger online toward systemic injustice faces an apparent trilemma: Express none but lose anger's valuable goods; express anger to heterogeneous audiences but risk aggravating inter-group polarization; or express anger to like-minded people but succumb to the epistemic pitfalls and extremist tendencies inherent to homogeneous groups. Solving the trilemma requires cultivating an online environment as a deliberative system composed of four kinds of groups—each with distinct purposes and norms. I argue that applying empirically-guided design principles to this systems framework provides political anger a place where its powers can serve justice without damaging the epistemic, ethical, emotional, and community resources required for a democratic path to correcting systemic injustice.

“They Scare with Terror”: On the History of the Language of Violence in 1917

Task of the study is analysis of the specific features of political language of conflict during the revolutionary epoch. Such an approach helps analyze the processes of verbalization of violence, understand the logic of brutalization and social polarization. Without studying this problem it is hard to explain how the cult of terror targeting political adversaries became possible. The article examines the application of the concept of “terror” during the Revolution of 1917. Based on a study of speeches by materials of discussions at various levels, newspapers, diaries the author demonstrates what arguments were used for legitimation and delegitimation of the terror. The author of the article analyzed the processes of infiltration of culture of violence into the mass culture in 1917. The conflict culture, formed during the 1917 revolution under the impact of various factors (influence of the revolutionary underground subculture) increasingly widespread use of terror. The conclusion reached was that all political forces used the collocation “terror”, and they utilized the fear of terror for their own purposes. Special attention is paid to the memory policy of socialist revolutionaries. The articulation of the terror became an important factor that prepared it — concept “terror” legitimised the use of violence, formalised and structured the increasingly political conflicts. The various crisis situations of the revolutionary epoch led to escalation of the struggle against enemies: destruction (political and even physical) of the adversary was described as the means for exiting the crisis. Influence of this cultural factor reduced contributed to the processes of dehumanization, alienation of the enemy, and set up a specific framework in which various political actors had to operate. In 1917, the language of violence spread, which had an impact on the course of the revolution.

Глобальні виклики та ризики як детермінанти економічного прогресу країн у контексті глобальних трансформацій

The aim of the article is to identify the global challenges and risks that determine the economic progress of countries in the context of global transformations. The study argues that the global transformations of recent decades have radically changed the geopolitical and geo-economic space, influencing the dynamics of economic development and socioeconomic progress. It has been established that in research, economic progress is often equated with economic development and economic growth. Scientific approaches of domestic researchers to the understanding of economic progress are considered. It is confirmed that global economic progress is a multidimensional process and is not limited only to the economic sphere, it combines technological, social, political, informational and other kinds of progress. The dynamics of the distribution of the countries of the world by the level of gross national income (GNI) per capita has been determined. The dynamics of economic growth in the world is analyzed. A slowdown in economic growth for countries has been identified and the main reasons for this phenomenon have been identified. An assessment of the risk structure for the short-term (2 years) and long-term (10 years) periods was carried out in accordance with a study by the World Economic Forum. The role of false information and disinformation among the threats to economic progress is revealed. The spread of propaganda and false information has been confirmed to affect press freedom. It is argued that the disinformation industry threatens both political and economic stability, deepens the crisis of democracy in the world. An analysis of the change of political regimes in the world is carried out, changes in political systems in the regions are evaluated. Threats to global democracy have been identified. Among the determinants of economic progress, cybersecurity is singled out. The main global cyber threats are analyzed. The role of violation of the principles of peace and security in maintaining global economic development is argued. The main environmental risks, which are important determinants of economic progress, have been identified. It is emphasized that climate change leads to the depletion of natural resources, which are important for economic activity. Another threat is the growing number of so-called climate refugees. Social polarization is confirmed to be a risk to the global economy and global economic progress. The dynamics of the Social Progress Index is analyzed. The measures necessary to achieve global economic progress taking into account global challenges and risks are proposed.

Factors of social equilibrium shaping and preventing violence

The continuous landscape of violence that unfolds parallel to everyday life undermines our sense of well-being, security, and trust in the effectiveness of institutions that are evidently failing to guide individuals to act and react in socially desirable ways. In the paper, the authors explore the phenomenon of violence within the framework of objectively established structures and the circumstances under which economic polarization and power polarization dominate, arguing that mass shootings represent factors that significantly influence the emergence and frequency of violence. Since moral competence is one of the key resources of society for successfully coping with adaptive demands, particularly during crises, increasing connectedness, developing moral competence, and enhancing empathy are imperatives for building a society that can consistently and effectively respond to the (moral) challenges posed by its environment. The paper aims to point towards ideas on violence prevention by affirming the importance of moral competence in preventing violence, thereby preventing moral confusion, and reducing the risk of society?s inadequate response to moral challenges.

Do Sentence-Level Sentiment Interactions Matter? Sentiment Mixed Heterogeneous Network for Fake News Detection

With the proliferation of fake news, the spread of misleading information can easily cause social panic and group polarization. Many existing methods for detecting fake news rely on linguistic and semantic features extracted from the content of the news. Some existing approaches focus on sentiment analysis for fake news detection, but the sentiment changes and sentence-level emotional interactions in news classification are not fully analyzed. Fortunately, we observe that in long-form news, the change and mutual influence of sentiment between sentences are different. To extract the features of sentiment interaction between sentences in the article, we propose a graph attention network-based model that combines both sentiment and external knowledge comparison to meet the needs of fake news classification. We obtain the contextual sentiment representation and entity representation of the sentence through the heterogeneous network and the emotion interaction network and obtain the change of the sentiment vector through the emotion comparison network. We compare the entity vectors in the context with those corresponding knowledge base (KB)-based, combine them with the contextual semantic representation of the sentence, and finally input them into the classifier. In experiments, our model performs well in both single and multiclass classification, achieving the state-of-the-art accuracy on existing datasets.

The Application of Big Data Analysis in Elderly Oriented Renovation Space Design

In order to understand the application of big data analysis in the design of elderly-oriented renovation spaces, an application study of big data analysis in the design of elderly-oriented renovation spaces has been proposed. The rapid development of the economy has led to the prosperity and spatial expansion of cities. At the same time, social issues such as land scarcity, traffic congestion, environmental pollution, and the uneven allocation of urban spatial resources have led to social polarization, marginalization of the interests of vulnerable groups, and seriously affected the physical and mental health of residents. With the intensification of the aging trend of the world population, aging has become a major global strategic issue. How to create a truly suitable spatial environment for elderly living has become a question worth considering. This article uses methods such as questionnaire surveys and in-depth interviews to obtain a large amount of data, analyze the current situation of the living space of the elderly in Changchun City, the physiological and psychological needs, activity characteristics, social interaction characteristics, etc. of the elderly group, and then propose suggestions for the planning and design of the living space of healthy urban elderly.

Manifestation’s Minimization of Social Exclusion In Ukraine Based on Overcoming Dysfunctionality of the Socio-Economic Systems Regulation

Achievement of balanced development of socio-economic systems of different levels lies in the plane of effective regulation of processes arising as a result of the action of various factors associated with negative phenomena of both an economic and social nature. Ensuring effective regulatory influence on the part of state and regional authorities is a guarantee of sustainable socio-economic development of the state and its regions, reducing interregional disparities, increasing the investment attractiveness of territories, preventing complications on a political, economic, and interethnic basis. This, in turn, is the basis of national state policy, as well as regional policy as its integral component. The modern dynamism of socio-economic development poses new challenges to the state due to the need to counteract the negative effects of the incessant transformations. We consider the strengthening of inequality and processes of social polarization caused by changes in the social structure of society to be the most striking of them. These changes have resulted today in the spread of such a negative social phenomenon as social exclusion. The problem of social exclusion in Ukraine and its regions is primarily related to the dysfunctionality of the processes of regulation of the main spheres of ensuring citizens' livelihoods, in particular, the spheres of employment, wages, social guarantees and the availability of social services. In addition, the significant risk for individuals to fall into the category of socially excluded today is caused by the presence of other destabilizing factors of an economic nature. These factors include the presence of significant imbalances in the labor market, in particular, a high level of unemployment and a reduction in the number of jobs, a significant level of poverty, including among the working population, the risk of not getting a job in accordance with the acquired qualification level and other factors that are especially threatening for the preservation and development of the human potential of the state.

사회 정의 관점에서의 아동 교육복지 정책 분석

[Purpose] This study investigates educational welfare policies to address the widening educational disparities among low-income children and adolescents under increasing social polarization. It focuses on analyzing the enactment of social justice in the Head Start program in the USA, Sure Start in the UK, and Dream Start in South Korea.
 [Methods] Employing Gewirtz and Cribb's(2002) plural models of social justice, an extension of John Rawls' theory of distributive justice, this study examines the threefold aspects of 'distributive, cultural, and organizational justice' in these policies.
 [Results] Key findings highlight that these policies variously achieve distributive, cultural, and organizational justice through effective resource allocation, information accessibility, recognition of beneficiary diversity, and democratic participation. Specific emphasis is placed on the need for equitable information distribution in distributive justice, acknowledgment of diversity in cultural justice, and democratic stakeholder participation in organizational justice.
 [Conclusion] The study underscores the necessity of exploring how these justice dimensions interact and coexist, proposing policy recommendations for the future trajectory of child education welfare.