Poland’s real divide is emotional, not ideological

This article is a part of Poland Unpacked. Weekly intelligence for decision-makers

We see Poland as a deeply divided country, even though on key issues we disagree far less than we might think. The latest report by the New Community Foundation and SWPS University, The State of Polarization 2026, highlights the gap between Poles’ actual views and the mutual hostility they feel toward one another.

A family gathering, a vacation or a night out with friends. Everything is pleasant – until politics enters the room. Tensions rise, looks turn sour, and sometimes arguments break out. Then we turn to social media, where attention-grabbing algorithms keep us hooked by feeding our outrage toward the other side. In the comments, insults laced with anger, hostility and a desire for revenge tend to dominate.

Three faces of polarization

We all recognize these images – or at least we believe they reflect reality. Yet it turns out that real social life is far less heated than social-media feeds. Issues we regard as polarizing, in reality, divide us far less than we think, while many things continue to bring us together.

That is the picture of Polish society that emerges from the latest report by the New Community Foundation and SWPS University, The State of Polarization 2026.

Researchers surveyed more than 1,000 Poles to measure the extent of polarization in Poland. They examined ideological polarization – that is, how much our actual views differ; affective polarization, or the hostility we feel toward people with different views; and perceived polarization, or how strongly we feel that we live in a divided country. The findings offer a nuanced picture of Polish society.

What still unites us

The authors asked respondents which issues in social life mattered most to them. The answers most often included the threat from Russia, the rising cost of living, the independence of the courts from politics, and access to doctors and hospitals. Of the 13 issues identified, access to doctors and hospitals emerged as by far the most important: 58% of respondents ranked healthcare among their three top concerns.

The cost of living came second, at 48%, followed by wages and the threat from Russia, each cited by 28%. Importantly, these concerns cut across party lines, regardless of respondents’ political preferences.

That does not, of course, mean that respondents shared similar views on policies to boost wages or on the country’s defense policy. And this is perhaps the most interesting finding of the study. On none of the 13 issues analyzed did researchers find strong ideological polarization – that is, substantial differences in Poles’ actual views on the issue in question.

The most polarizing of the 13 topics were abortion, the fairness of elections, and access to doctors and hospitals, in that order. The smallest differences emerged over the independence of the courts from politics, students’ mental health, and the rising cost of living.

The researchers suggest that polarization over people’s actual views on specific issues is, at most, moderate. This points to an important conclusion: there is room for potential agreement on key issues.

Where does all this mutual hostility come from?

But this is where another problem emerges: affective polarization.

Research shows that we perceive people with different views very differently from those whose views we tend to share.

Poles are less likely to want to be friends with people who hold different views, less likely to want to talk to them, and even less likely to help them. Importantly, there has been a marked shift compared with last year’s findings.

In 2025, nearly half of respondents said they were willing to form friendships with, or work with on a daily basis, people who held different views. This year, only one in four said they would be willing to be friends with someone from the opposite end of the political spectrum, while 29% said they would be willing to work with such a person on a daily basis. The authors do not specify whether this reflects a genuine increase in hostility or differences between the two surveys.

“Negative emotions rooted in political views are not linked to gender, education or place of residence. Older people, those of lower socioeconomic status, people with left-wing views and those with a greater interest in politics tend to be somewhat more negative. More religious people, by contrast, tend to be somewhat less negative,” the report says.

So where does this striking gap between moderate ideological polarization and strong affective polarization come from? Why, despite broadly similar diagnoses of the problems facing the country, do we express such strong hostility toward one another?

Sociologist: we overestimate how extreme our opponents’ views are

Prof. Marta Żerkowska-Balas of SWPS University, a co-author of the report, has an explanation for the phenomenon.

“Affective polarization is not a simple reflection of differences in views. This is one of the key findings of our study, and it is also supported by the academic literature. Hostility revolves around identity, not specific positions or demands: we argue not about what should be done, but about who the other side is. Even issues on which we broadly agree, such as the threat from Russia, function in elite discourse as tests of loyalty: we do not differ in our assessment of the situation, but in whom we trust and whom we blame, while rhetoric about agents and traitors turns the dispute into a moral one. Then there is the mechanism of false polarization: we systematically overestimate the extremity of our opponents’ views, so we direct our emotions toward an imagined rather than a real opponent. High stakes – security and survival – only raise the emotional temperature further,” says Prof. Marta Żerkowska-Balas.

The emotional temperature becomes even more apparent in the mutual feelings between supporters of different parties. Voters of the Confederation of the Polish Crown and Civic Coalition are the most hostile toward each other. The warmest feelings – though it would be a stretch to call them affection – are found between supporters of Civic Coalition and the New Left.

Who dislikes whom more?

Interestingly, Left voters report strongly negative feelings toward Confederation voters, while Confederation supporters do not view Left voters quite as harshly in return.

Can we therefore conclude that the left-wing electorate expresses stronger hostility toward its opponents than the other side does? Prof. Marta Żerkowska-Balas points to a somewhat different aspect.

“It is worth starting with a methodological caveat: we are talking here about moderately strong correlations, not causal relationships. This means that certain characteristics, such as left-wing views, lower levels of religiosity or greater interest in politics, are more often associated with strong hostility toward opponents than others, but that does not mean they cause it. Interest in politics is the most consistent correlate of affective polarization worldwide. Greater engagement means a stronger political identity and greater exposure to conflict-driven messaging; politics becomes a personal matter for these people,” says the SWPS sociologist and political scientist.

In her view, the Polish context is crucial to understanding these mutual animosities.

“The left-wing electorate is the most ideologically distinct and is a minority, while the issues that matter most to it – abortion, minority rights, and church-state relations – are heavily moralized. Moralizing a dispute makes compromise impossible and, as a result, fuels hostility toward the other side, especially when people feel that their own values are under threat. Religiosity, in turn, embeds people in communities and norms of kindness that can temper hostility. In Poland, it also partly overlaps with the left-right divide, making it difficult to fully disentangle the two effects,” Prof. Marta Żerkowska-Balas notes.

Poland is more centrist than we think

Perhaps the most important finding of The State of Polarization 2026 concerns the actual distribution of views in Polish society. Based on respondents’ declarations on key issues, Polish society is, above all, centrist. Some 27% of respondents place their views in the center, while smaller shares identify with left- or right-wing positions. Yet despite this, most respondents feel that the level of polarization in Poland is high.

To what extent, then, is so-called perceived polarization a function of the actions of various political actors, and how much is driven by our own cognitive biases?

“It is a feedback loop, not an either-or choice. External actors provide the fuel: conflict-driven framing pays off for politicians and the media, while algorithms overrepresent extreme voices. But it is our own cognitive biases, rooted in group dynamics – or what is sometimes called tribal thinking – negative attitudes, the tendency to see members of an out-group as all alike, and the automatic attribution of bad intentions – that make this messaging stick,” the professor notes.

She adds that the researchers were able to capture the scale of this disconnect.

“We want a society with a strong center, and in fact that is what we have. Yet 69% of us perceive deep divisions. This gap between perception and reality is largely a product of public discourse. It is also telling that respondents blame politicians in general (43%), but almost exclusively politicians from the other side (33%), rather than their own (5%). That in itself illustrates our bias. Responsibility is therefore shared, and the good news is that perceptions can be influenced – for instance, by correcting our assumptions about what the other side actually thinks,” the researcher concludes.

Psychologist: if necessary, let it go

So how should we talk to people who hold different views? During the summer, people traditionally steer clear of politics, but in today’s reality, the political off-season is a thing of the past and there is always a current issue to discuss. What, then, should we do when the tension in a conversation starts to rise?

Psychologist Dorota Minta suggests paying attention to why difficult topics arise in the first place.

“Why do we start discussing something at all? Do we simply want to show who we are and the political, ideological, ethical or scientific context in which we operate? These can, after all, be very controversial topics. Or perhaps we simply want to convince someone that we are right? I think we often forget that talking about our views is a kind of presentation of ourselves and a way of shaping our own image. The other person then learns: ‘OK, they hold these views, but they are great at playing bridge or wonderful at fishing, so I will still enjoy spending time with them,’” the psychologist says.

As Dorota Minta adds, intent matters.

“The intention behind a conversation, alongside its content, is crucial here. It is also important that if the other person pushes back or is surprised by our views, we should not let the discussion escalate, but simply say: ‘You know what, OK. I know we disagree, but I enjoy spending time with you because we have other things in common.’”

But what if the subject refuses to go away and emotions continue to rise?

“If we see that the other person – even if we initially intended to convince them of something – has firm, well-considered views, does not want to be persuaded, or simply has no desire to discuss the subject with us, then we should just let it go. Really, at such a moment we should ask ourselves what matters more to us: fighting for an idea or preserving our relationship with this particular person?” psychologist Dorota Minta concludes.

The State of Polarization 2026 report finds that ideological polarization among Poles – that is, actual differences in views on specific issues – is moderate. Researchers found no strong polarization of views on any of the 13 issues examined. Topics such as the threat from Russia, the rising cost of living and access to healthcare proved important to respondents regardless of their party preferences.
Despite broadly similar diagnoses of social problems, Poles express strong hostility toward people with different views. Willingness to be friends with such people fell from nearly half of respondents in 2025 to just one in four in 2026. According to Prof. Marta Żerkowska-Balas of SWPS University, a co-author of the report, this hostility stems more from political identity than from genuine differences in views.
The study reveals a clear gap between the actual distribution of views and the subjective perception of division. Although 27% of respondents place their views in the political center, and the extremes account for smaller shares, 69% nevertheless see Poland as a deeply divided country. The authors argue that this gap is driven both by conflict-driven narratives from politicians and the media and by cognitive mechanisms such as attributing blame almost exclusively to politicians on the opposing side.