Affective polarization has become a central concept to explain how citizens think and behave in Western democracies. However, while research has made great progress studying the causes, consequences, and remedies of this concept, we know surprisingly little about how affective polarization actually feels. This research note contributes to recent efforts to characterize affective polarization with specific emotions. Drawing on cross-sectional data from five European countries (Denmark, Germany, Italy, Poland, and the United Kingdom; total N = 4,794), we analyze which emotions respondents report to experience toward in-party and out-party voters and which of these emotions correlate with affective polarization scores. While we find that only a few respondents report negative emotions toward in-party voters, they feel moderate amounts of hope, enthusiasm, and pride without being exuberant. Fear-related emotions toward out-party voters are rare, and while one in five respondents experiences extreme anger, disappointment, or disgust toward opponents, up to 50% experience these emotions just slightly or not at all. The emotions most consistently related to affective polarization are positive emotions toward in-party voters and – to a lesser extent – aversion, hate, and disgust toward opponents. We describe patterns across countries and demographic backgrounds and highlight a practical implication: affective polarization feels more positive than what prevailing notions of ‘fear and loathing’ let believe.

Hot-iron disbudding is a very common, painful procedure performed in dairy farms. One of the gold standard practices recommends combining the use of a local anaesthetic (e.g. procaine) and analgesic (e.g. meloxicam) to control pain. However, it is unknown if calves still experience pain during and after the procedure when using multi-modal pain relief. Here, we explored the affective consequence of disbudding using a conditioned place aversion paradigm where inferences are based on learnt aversion to places associated with negative experiences. We conducted two experiments: (1) calves were disbudded in their home-pen and then conditioned immediately afterwards for 6 h so that conditioning involved post-operative pain only; and (2) calves were disbudded in the conditioning compartment and remained there for the following 6 h so that conditioning included the potential pain and fear from the procedure and any post-operative pain. All calves were conditioned in the other (control) conditioning compartment either 2 days before or after disbudding. In both experiments, calves who were disbudded on the second conditioning (control conditioning happening 2 days before the procedure) showed no aversion to the compartment associated with disbudding, suggesting that pain was minimal in the 6 h post-disbudding. However, in Experiment 2, calves displayed a preference for the disbudding compartment when disbudding occurred first (control conditioning happened 2 days later) suggesting they were in more pain on day 2 than in the hours following the procedure. These results show that calves may experience pain for days after hot-iron disbudding, calling for more work on long-lasting pain following disbudding.

This article examines Charles Bell’s experimental practices by drawing historiographical attention away from the priority disputes over the spinal nerve functions for which he was most famous. I argue that Bell’s primary research interest was the expression of emotions. To this end, he developed a programme of vivisection that explored the underlying mechanisms of emotion. However, this also resulted in a profound contradiction between his experimental practices and his worldview – conducting painful experiments on beloved animals despite moral revulsion towards animal experimentation. This opens up three interconnected areas. Firstly, it allows an exploration of disciplinary identity in medicine, particularly the way that disciplines demanded specific practices and behaviours. Secondly, vivisection more generally required methods and ethics that opposed the growing anti-cruelty voice. Here, a combination of animal choice and the importation of techniques from the slaughterhouses was critical. Thirdly, vivisectors navigated a complex emotional landscape between their professional obligations and broader cultural sensibilities. These three areas are linked together using Boddice’s concept of moral economies, the affective frameworks that structured feelings. Particularly important were the sentimental and Romantic economies, both of which impacted Bell and his research. At the same time, Bell always struggled to reconcile the tensions between his disciplinary identity and his sentimental and Romantic beliefs, ultimately leading him to abandon experimentation after his assistant John Shaw’s death. I conclude by identifying the guarantees provided by character for licensing ostensibly cruel behaviours, thus allowing for the maintenance of probity within competing moral economies.

This article argues that music can reflect and express the ideas that define particular cultures by considering the presence of concepts from Canadian philosophy in the nation’s music. It begins by examining how musical compositions can incorporate philosophical notions before surveying some themes in Canadian philosophy. The article then identifies these concepts from Canadian philosophy in the musical compositions of artists such as Léo Pol Morin, R. Murray Schafer, Udo Kasemets, Michael Snow, Glenn Gould, R. Bruce Elder (this article’s author), and David Jaeger.

Previous research conducted in closed autocracies indicates that government propaganda can deter opposition, shift political attitudes, and influence emotions. Yet the specific mechanisms and contextual factors influencing how and when propaganda works remain unclear. We theorize how power-projecting government propaganda works differently for government supporters and opponents in polarized electoral authoritarian regimes, focusing on emotional reactions, sense of societal belonging, and downstream effects on contentious political behavior. Through two preregistered surveys in Turkey (N = 6,286), we find that supporters exposed to propaganda videos feel a greater sense of belonging and are more susceptible to engage in pro-government activities. Opponents report heightened anger and anxiety and seem deterred from protesting. However, the latter effect weakened during the highly contested 2023 electoral campaign. These results indicate that propaganda can help electoral authoritarian regimes deter anti-government action and encourage pro-government action, but that its deterrent effects may weaken during periods of high mobilization and contention.

The political participation of Black women has important consequences for electoral outcomes in the US, yet little is known about whether and how affect (both negative and positive) influences this group’s engagement in American politics. Despite the prevalent stereotype that Black women are “angry,” scholarly exploration of the effects of the emotions of these women is rare. In this paper, we highlight a gap in theories that center on Black women and argue that survey question wording about affect may impact how Black women express positive or negative emotions in relation to their political behavior. Using 2016 and 2020 CMPS data, we find support for our expectations. This project highlights the importance of group-specific, intersectional theories and the potential limitations to our understanding of how affect influences political participation.

Violations of sovereignty not only generate emotional diplomatic outbursts but are also frequently the subject of multilateral engagements. One paradigmatic example of a sovereignty violation engendering this kind of response is that of state-led international kidnappings. But why do the victims of sovereignty violations multilateralise such transgressions? What makes them think that other states will be receptive to such attempts? To answer this question, we theorise the role of performative emotionality in maintaining the institution of sovereignty. Specifically, we conceptualise sovereignty as a social institution that constructs states as persons, and thus as bearers of dignity, and upholds this construction through shared feeling rules. This reveals sovereignty violations to be primarily a denial of dignity, that is, the expectation to be treated as an autonomous person of equal moral worth, which demands an appropriate emotional performance from all states, not just those involved in the sovereignty dispute. This performance is shaped by the international system’s colonial legacy, embodied in an enduring standard of civilisation. To illustrate this, we analyse two instances of state-led international kidnappings: Argentina’s response to the abduction of Adolf Eichmann by Israeli agents in 1960, and Japan’s ongoing response to the kidnapping of multiple Japanese citizens by North Korea.

This article explores how emotions can affect policies of hostage rescue and recovery. Any hostage rescue/recovery strategy must consider the relative weights of at least three major goals: 1) maximising chance of recovering/rescuing the hostages; 2) punishment of the kidnappers; and 3) avoidance of collateral damage and killing of bystanders. This article will show how an understanding of emotion can help explain why one of these goals comes to dominate another, why one goal fades in importance. The article will argue that a specific combination of two emotions – anger and contempt – drives the elevation of the punishment goal above that of maximising chances of hostage recovery while also greatly diminishing any value of collateral damage avoidance. The article considers these issues with a short case study of hostage taking at Attica Prison in 1971, which serves as a link to the main case – Israel’s post–October 7 hostage policy towards Gaza.

Peaceful transfers of power are a fundamental principle of democracy. Yet, in times of heightened affective polarisation, election losses may trigger strong negative emotional reactions in partisans, which in turn undermine support for fundamental democratic principles among partisans. We test this idea through two pre-registered survey experiments conducted after the 2022 and 2024 elections in the United States. We randomly assign partisans to receive either a placebo or an emotive reminder about the election that their party lost, containing others’ angry or worried reactions at the election outcome. Contrary to our pre-registered expectations, we do not find evidence that priming negative feelings about electoral loss affects support for political violence or democratic norms. Emotive reminders about salient political events can momentarily turn up the heat on politics, but are not enough to propel partisans to adopt extreme anti-democratic attitudes. By linking the study of emotions to democratic norms, this article contributes to our understanding of when negative emotions (fail to) radicalise partisans.

The family is rarely a topic of international politics, but politicised captivity is one of the few domains where familial relations can play a prominent role. Crucially, the families involved generally lack the traditional power resources of wealth or official status that would normally be understood to influence outcomes within international politics. What they do possess, however, is a different set of emotional–political resources that both evoke emotion and invoke a diverse set of social rules concerning emotional experience. To explore our claims, we examine the case of the family of Yokota Megumi, a thirteen-year-old Japanese girl abducted by North Korea. This case both illustrates the potential of emotional–political resources to mobilise action and also highlights the risks that emotional narratives of families can be leveraged by political actors for their own purposes.