A new survey examining how Americans think about democracy is raising concerns about the relationship between social isolation, age, and support for political violence.
The findings come from the first wave of the Kettering Foundation/Gallup Democracy for All Project, a five-year effort to track public attitudes toward democratic norms. More than 20,000 U.S. adults were surveyed between July 7 and Aug. 25, giving researchers one of the most detailed snapshots to date of how Americans view political violence, participation, and community connection.
One headline stands out: Five in six Americans say it is “never OK” to use violence to achieve a political goal. But the remaining 16% say violence is “sometimes OK”.
Age emerged as the strongest predictor of attitudes toward political violence. Adults 18 to 29 were more likely than any other age group to say violence can be acceptable in certain circumstances. The trend holds across gender and political affiliation, though young men showed higher levels of support than young women.
Researchers note that the level of social media use appears to correlate with these views as well. Heavy social media users were more likely to say political violence is sometimes justified than those with limited or no social media engagement.
Recent attacks, threats against public officials, and politically motivated violence carried out by young men have brought renewed attention to the role of social isolation, online radicalization, and civic stressors in shaping violent behaviors.
The long-term project aims to explore these trends further over the next five years — and this initial release offers an early look at what the research team expects will be evolving national attitudes.
Click here to read the full results.
(AI was used in part to facilitate this article.)
