Democracy is founded on the spirit of political competition. Healthy competition among political parties is central to democracy because they mobilize voters across diverse ideas and values within society. Within these diverse ideas and values cross-party collaboration is vital to support strong democracy and provide solutions to challenges within the countries. However, when political parties and society fragment along divisive lines political polarization — the divergence of political attitudes from the center — can make collaboration and compromise difficult or nearly impossible.

When faced with the complex challenges that polarization poses to democracy, it is critical that political parties band together in an effort to combat these divisions. As the aggregators of political views in a country, political parties play a vital role in mitigating the detrimental impacts of political polarization and the most effective mechanism for them to do so is via cross-party collaboration. 

Beyond Polarization: Collaboration and Dialogue for Political Parties is a practical guide designed to assist political party practitioners in the process of strategically planning and implementing cross-party initiatives in coalition-building, policy development, and communications.