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Could the United States be headed for a national divorce?
There is a growing divide in US society and politics along old civil war battle lines – and the election could make things worse.
Bruce Stokes
The American Civil War (1861-65) was fought over slavery and, to a lesser extent, states’ rights and the future of the economy. In the run-up to the 2024 US elections, there is talk of another civil war brewing over the country’s future.
While there is no imminent threat of armies clashing on the battlefield, increasing hyperbolic insurrectionist sentiment is a product of a growing realization that the US is now more divided along ideological and political lines than at any time since the 1850s.
An increasingly Balkanized US is likely to be even more inward-looking, preoccupied with internal divisions over immigration, race, inequality, and sexual and gender identity issues. Such self-absorption is already manifesting itself in isolationism and protectionism at the expense of the security and economic alliances that have greatly benefitted the US and the world for decades.
Half (54 per cent) of self-described strong Republicans in America now think it is very or somewhat likely there will be a US civil war within the next decade. Four in ten (40 per cent) strong Democrats agree.
