Writing from Mussolini’s prison in 1930, the Italian political theorist Antonio Gramsci observed of democracies in his era: “The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.”  In our era, something about the old forms of democracy also seems to be dying.

The last decade and a half have witnessed pervasive dissatisfaction with democratic governments throughout the West.  As a result, governments have become more fragile and unstable.  In the last two years alone, the governments of Europe’s dominant powers, Germany and France, have collapsed, as did those in Portugal, the Netherlands, and Canada.  The U.K. has been forced to hold three snap elections in the last seven years.  No matter which parties are in power, citizens are dissatisfied.

Politics is exceptionally turbulent.  Since 2000 in the U.S., every election but two has changed which party controls either the House, the Senate, or the White House.  That rate of churning is unprecedented.

All this reflects a new era I call one of “political fragmentation.”  Political fragmentation means the myriad ways in which practical political power is now dispersed among many different actors and centers of power, including a proliferation of insurgent political parties in Europe, more extreme political factions in the U.S., an explosion of organized outside groups, or the new-found power of even unorganized groups and a host of individual influencers.  This fragmentation of politics, which media fragmentation accelerates, makes it increasingly difficult to marshal sufficient political power and legitimate authority to address democratic citizens’ major concerns effectively.

In Western Europe, the traditionally dominant, large center-left and center-right parties, which had governed since World War II, have been hemorrhaging voters or nearly disappearing completely.  In the Germany of the 1990s, the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats together received more than 75% support; today, they fail together to generate even 50% support.  In the U.K., Labour and the Conservatives typically combined for 90% of popular support; polls today put them together at a mere 38%. In France, the Republicans and Socialists have been unable even to get a candidate to the final round of their presidential election.  

Alienated from traditional political elites and parties, voters in the proportional-representation systems of Europe have turned to new, more extreme parties on the left and right, including anti-system parties.  The new-right parties have particularly exploded.  Marine Le Pen’s National Rally Party became France’s leading party after its recent 2024 election. Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy is Italy’s leading party; she is now Prime Minister.  The Alternative for Germany (AfD) became the second largest party in Germany’s most recent election.  Geert Wilders’ Party for Freedom is the largest in the Netherlands.  The Sweden Democrats are that country’s second largest party; in Portugal, the Chega Party, formed in 2019, is now the second largest.  Despite country-level nuances, many of these new-right parties endorse more restrictive immigration policies and traditional cultural values, while being economically populist and supportive of the welfare state.  As this chart shows, across 27 European countries, these parties in the aggregate now capture similar vote shares as the traditional center-left and center-right parties and coalitions:

Those who imagine older voters resistant to change drive support for these parties will be surprised.  Young voters, alienated and dissatisfied, support these new-right parties at high rates.  Among younger voters in most of these countries, these parties are either the most popular or the second most, with more extreme parties of the left the most popular.

These patterns also reflect the decline of the traditional left, as working-class voters across the West - a much larger share of the electorate than many realize – view the parties of the left as having abandoned their interests on economic and, even more so, cultural issues.  Across Europe, the average support for right-wing parties is 13 points higher than for left-wing parties, the largest gap since at least 1990.   This new landscape, fertilized by the communications revolution, makes politics more fragmented and turbulent, as parties struggle to figure out how to appeal to their radically reconfigured bases of support.

Similar forces have been re-shaping U.S. democracy, though they take different form in our two-party system.  The combined approval of the two parties in recent years is among the lowest ever recorded.  Disdain for traditional political elites is reflected in the appeal of outsiders:  Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Zohran Mamdani.  Donald Trump has absorbed into the Republican Party many of the policies of Europe’s new-right parties.  Democrats, particularly younger voters, have been turning to self-characterized socialists at the far pole of the party.  Reflecting the same realignment as in Europe, Donald Trump’s 2024 coalition in income and educational terms stunningly resembles Bill Clinton’s from the 1990s:

The U.S. two-party system means the structural forces driving external party fragmentation in Europe drive internal party fragmentation here.  For a decade, the Republican party was torn between more populist and more traditional factions; the party devoured three of its own Speakers of the House, with former Speaker John Boehner calling his own caucus “ungovernable.”  Ever since the bitter Sanders-Clinton nomination fight in 2016, the Democratic Party has become increasingly divided between a more populist, progressive wing and a more moderate one; as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said in 2020, “in any other country, Joe Biden and I would not be in the same party.” Conflicts over whether the party needs to move more to the left or the center are likely to remain intense.

For better or worse, the U.S. two-party system, during unified government, makes it easier to overcome fragmentation than in Europe.  Whether Republicans in Congress this time can overcome the internal conflicts that limited their legislative achievements in Trump I, other than tax cuts, is too early to assess.  Executive action has dominated governance thus far, and even internally fractious parties typically approve their President’s nominees.  But a united Republican Congress did manage to pass the massive “Big Beautiful Bill.”  Whether Republicans will be united enough to pass further major legislation before the midterms remains to be seen.       

Perhaps the political fragmentation we see through much of democratic politics today is a “morbid symptom” of transition to a new form of democratic politics.  Much turns on whether it is temporary and contingent or more enduring.  Political fragmentation reflects continual democratic dissatisfaction, but perversely, also makes it that much harder for governments to respond effectively to citizens’ demands.  And when democracies are unable to do so, alienation and anger can give way to worse (or perhaps already has), including yearnings for strongman leaders who promise they alone can deliver.