The urban-rural cleavage: Analysing more than 40 years of Norwegian survey data

In recent years, the political divide between urban and rural dwellers seems to have increased. Current literature has described the rise of a green, progressive and left-leaning urban electorate and a nationalist and conservative rural population. However, research usually lacks historical data on these developments outside of majoritarian systems. We provide new insights into the urban-rural divide's evolution in a European multi-party welfare state by analysing more than four decades of data from Norway and asking: How has the urban-rural divide over political issues evolved from a long-term perspective? Using unique election survey data, we analyse how both attitudes and most important issues among rural and urban voters in Norway have changed between 1977 and 2021. We also assess whether urban-rural differences are driven by sociodemographic change. Our results indicate both stability and change. On one hand, we find attitude polarisation in Norway on some issues: Divisions over environmental policy have increased, as the urban population displays more progressive attitudes than rural citizens over time. Rural citizens have become more concerned with centre and periphery issues. However, in other areas, we find stability and a relatively low degree of polarisation. For example, the rural population in Norway has become more similar to urban citizens regarding moral and religious issues. Furthermore, rural citizens have not become more right-leaning on economic questions, which has been a finding in more adversarial systems.