Whatever happens with Brexit, the EU referendum has spawned two political tribes. The identities “leaver” and “remainer” cut across traditional party divides: research suggests they are replacing Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat as indicators of political identity. But how much do they really differ?
The YouGov-Cambridge Globalism survey, which is being released in partnership with the Guardian, suggests there may be more that unites leavers and remainers than divides them.
Graphs plotting the distributions of their answers to a range of questions often show a bell curve in which both sides mostly overlap, even on divisive issues such as immigration. It seems the starkest differences relate to British identity itself – with a notable divergence on gender politics.
- Event - The new populism, a threat to democracy? Tickets are now on sale for a Guardian event at Milton Court in the city of London on May 14 2019. Stephan Shakespeare, chief executive and founder of YouGov, will introduce the evening offering a brief insight into the research on which this article is based, and will be joined by experts on populism including Cas Mudde and Elif Shafak.
