Introduction

At a time when American politics experiences extreme partisan divide, one area of policy still looks surprisingly cooperative. On July 29th, 2026, the United States Navy announced $76.6 billion in contracts for the construction of Columbia- and Virginia-class nuclear submarines as well as other shipyard investments. Earlier that year, Democratic Senator Jack Reed and Republican Senator Susan Collins collaborated on a bipartisan bill aimed at strengthening the shipbuilding workforce, which will now require an estimated 100,000 new skilled workers over the next decade. This poses an important question: If American politics has become so polarized, why has submarine policy remained an area of bipartisan cooperation? I am going to argue that the perseverance of democratic norms, specifically cooperation, on submarine production suggests that democratic erosion is uneven across American policy. Submarine policymaking provides an example where cross-party cooperation is able to continue functioning because shared interests and benefits continue to motivate policymakers to work with their partisan rivals. 

Bipartisan Support in Practice

In May 2026, Democratic Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island and Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine led a bipartisan, bicameral bill focused on connecting Job Corps as well as other apprenticeships to the shipbuilding and industrial workforce. Their cooperation is not the only example, as the FY2026 National Defense Authorization Act advanced through the Senate with a 77-20 vote, with Senator Reed and Republican Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee Roger Wicker both emphasizing the bipartisan nature of this act. They continued to collaborate in June on the FY2027 NDAA process in Armed Services Committee meetings to prepare for the coming year. This level of cooperation and bipartisan support starkly stands out when compared with other major legislation. The 2025 reconciliation bill, H.R. 1, passed the Senate after a 50-50 tie required Vice President JD Vance to cast the deciding vote. Every Democrat voted against the bill, while nearly every Republican supported it. This contrast is useful because, although reconciliation and defense authorization are very different pieces of legislation, it demonstrates the ways that the same highly polarized Congress can show extremely different patterns of bipartisan cooperation depending on the area of policy. This contrast does not mean that all Democrats and Republicans broadly agree on defense policy. Instead, it offers a different perspective into political polarization in policymaking by suggesting that partisan divisions do not affect all areas of government in a uniform way. Submarine and shipbuilding policy remains one space where lawmakers from opposing parties continue to collaborate and work towards their shared interests while recognizing one another as legitimate.  

Mutual Toleration

Levitsky and Ziblatt help explain why continued cooperation within democracy matters. In How Democracies Die, Levitsky and Ziblatt identify mutual toleration as one of the “guardrails” of democracy, meaning that political actors recognize and accept their opponents as legitimate competitors with equal right to participate and govern. They argue that when opponents begin to view one another as “mortal enemies” (112) instead of political rivals, problems arise and politicians become more willing to discard other democratic norms. Bipartisan submarine policymaking offers a limited example where politicians continue to practice mutual toleration. Reed and Collins do not need to agree on every aspect of defense policy to work together and jointly sponsor shipbuilding legislation, just as Reed and Wicker do not need to belong to the same party in order to collaborate with one another through the Senate Armed Services Committee on defense legislation. Their cooperation does not mean that partisan conflict has disappeared. Instead, I think it helps shed light on how a political system typically viewed as deeply polarized can still have meaningful cross-party cooperation in some areas of policy. Mutual toleration still persists within submarine policy, and it shows in the efforts made by politicians to work together across party lines. 

Why Cooperation Still Survives

Lieberman et al. also help explain why mutual toleration matters so much for democracy. Lieberman et al. argue that strains on American democracy arise through the interaction of polarized two-party presidentialism, conflicts over membership and status, and the erosion of democratic norms (470-71). Their central point is that, when put together, these forces reinforce one another. When this happens, political conflict becomes more threatening to democratic stability. The ideas of Lieberman et al. help place submarine policy into a political system where polarization furthers the erosion of democratic norms, yet the submarine industry presents an interesting contrast. If polarization makes cooperation even more difficult, why has it not equally affected submarine politics as it has other politics? I think there are two main reasons. Firstly, submarine production takes place over the span of many years. For example, a single Virginia-class submarine takes roughly 5-7 years to complete. This means that programs cannot simply change every time a different political party is in power, which is why the contracts awarded in July cover multiple submarines for future production. This creates a strong need for continuity in the industry. Secondly, submarine policy creates overlapping interests that give politicians stronger incentives to work together in this particular field. While lawmakers may strongly disagree in other areas, submarine policy brings together national security, workforce development, suppliers, apprenticeship programs, and local economic benefits within the same policies. Politicians can support the same submarine programs for different reasons and still advance their own political priorities because these goals are tied together. I think this is why submarine policy has stayed more bipartisan than many other areas, both sides can get something they care about from the same policy. 

Democratic Resilience or Political Self-Interest?

However, I did have to ask myself whether this cooperation is really evidence of democratic resilience, or if it is simply a result of political self-interest because this type of defense spending benefits their own states, not because they are particularly committed to upholding democratic norms. This is really the limitation of my argument, because I cannot say that politicians will not act in their own interest when creating policy, but I do not think that the two explanations are mutually exclusive. Democratic institutions don’t require lawmakers to collaborate entirely selflessly. In fact, shared interests can give competing parties incentives to continue recognizing one another as legitimate to collaborate and govern with. Even if the motivation behind this cooperation is partly strategic, the outcome still helps preserve the pattern of institutional cooperation. So, in this way, I believe that political self-interest can actually help support democratic norms, instead of undermining them. 

What This Case Shows

U.S. submarine policy does not prove that democratic erosion is not a problem. Instead, it shows that, in areas with many overlapping goals and interests, democratic erosion affects them differently. Lieberman et al. show how polarization and weaker democratic norms can work together to make cooperation harder, while Levitsky and Ziblatt help explain why the continued recognition of political opponents as legitimate partners in government matters. My research into submarine policy suggests that when both parties have such strong reasons to keep working together, cooperation can survive even in a very polarized institution. In order to understand democratic erosion at its fullest, I think you need to study not only where democratic norms collapse, but also where they survive and why.