Abstract In March 2020, nine EU heads of state co-signed a letter demanding a coordinated response to the pandemic and the adoption of common debt. Recent literature has shown the relevance of the European Council in the response to the pandemic, as well as the rising importance of interstate coalitions in EU policymaking. Yet, empirical understanding of these coalitions is limited, and the literature largely assumes their constitution along ‘structuralist’ logics (e.g., ‘debtors’ vs. ‘creditors’). The emergence of a ‘solidarity coalition’ proposing the ‘coronabond’ is puzzling for its contrast with the euro crisis. The aim of this paper is to explain how these countries coalesced and to understand how that relates and informs a shift in the imperatives of ‘responsible government’ in the EU. Tracing the negotiation of the letter, through interviews and discourse analysis, the paper makes a critical contribution to our understanding of the evolution in EU economic governance.

Abstract Recent studies have drawn attention to the importance of pre-electoral coalitions in multiparty presidential democracies. Despite this, much scholarship has neglected the period during which pre-electoral coalitions turn into governing coalitions. Through a systematic cross-case analysis of Latin American cases, this paper examines why some coalition governments largely resemble the pre-electoral pacts that preceded them while others do not. The results lend credence to the legislative status granted by pre-election coalition members to the government, the low polarization among pre-electoral coalition members and the high ideological polarization in the legislature to explain the resemblance between pre- and post-electoral coalitions. Intriguingly, case-based analysis suggests that the temporal distance to government inauguration plays, at best, a marginal role in this process. These findings contribute to the still-growing literature on pre-electoral coalitions in presidential democracies by shedding light on the complex causation behind the pathway from pre-electoral bargaining to fully developed coalition governments.

Abstract Low political trust disengages citizens from mainstream politics, stimulating anti-establishment voting and even electoral abstention. However, existing scholarship has largely overlooked the temporal dynamics of political trust. Next to high versus low trust, our study identifies two additional components of political trust: its long-term variability and its short-term variation. We employ fifteen waves of the Dutch LISS panel (2008–2023) to systematically test the impact of these three components of political trust on electoral behavior. We find that there are systematic and meaningful differences between stable and variable (dis)trusters. While trust levels are the strongest predictor of both support for anti-establishment and abstention, trust variability has an additional effect on electoral behavior. Short-term declines in political trust increase the chances of anti-establishment voting and abstention, independent of individuals’ overall trust levels and variability. These findings have important implications for our understanding of democratic alienation and critical citizenship.

Abstract While secessionist movements have surged globally over the past century, the prevailing structuralist and institutionalist approaches inadequately capture the dynamics of secessionism. We argue that lost autonomy triggers, sudden transformative events symbolizing a loss of autonomy for ethnic minorities, can be profoundly disruptive, eliciting pro-secessionist backlashes. Despite their significance, the causal impact of such triggering events remains underexplored. We investigate two typical cases: the 1992 Great Bank Affair in the Faroe Islands and the 2010 Spanish Constitutional Court decision to reform Catalonia’s autonomy statute. Using synthetic control models, we demonstrate that these triggering events were essential for the subsequent secessionist waves, which would not have occurred otherwise. Qualitative process tracing analyses further support our findings, indicating that these events were perceived as highly disruptive, causing significant shifts in public opinion and prompting political responses. Our findings underscore the importance of recognizing lost autonomy triggers as proximate causes of secessionism.

Abstract Direct public funding (DPF) is a crucial resource for political parties in many of the world’s democracies. While research into the consequences of DPF has grown in prominence since the turn of the century, few efforts have been made to synthesize its findings. This article takes the first steps in doing so. Viewing DPF as an independent variable, we assess the impacts that party subsidization has on electoral competition, party organizations, party system development, and gender representation, before unpacking the intricacies of the DPF-corruption relationship. Given the inconclusive findings across these domains, the article discusses methodological challenges related to data availability and DPF operationalization, concluding with brief policy recommendations and several avenues for future research.

Abstract How do identities affect our political perceptions? Drawing on the social identity theory, we offer a new notion and empirical modeling strategy to study divergence in party placement perceptions. Our framework builds on the idea that membership in social groups has the potential to act as a social identity by systematically structuring perceptual divergence among groups. We conceptualize two consequences of social identity formation, ingroup favoritism and outgroup hostility: an ingroup effect brings a party closer to the preferred policy of the group; an outgroup effect pushes the party away. The approach permits detecting these effects and pinpoints the group-based characteristics producing perceptual polarization in multiparty systems using standard public opinion survey data. An application to the Basque region of Spain shows that over two decades, social identities around national sentiments and religion have produced the most perceptual divergence and polarization, whereas gender or social class do not structure party perceptions in the region.

Abstract Many, if not most, phenomena faced by political elites are characterized by uncertainty. This characterization also holds for the concept uncertainty itself, with conceptualizations and operationalizations differing both across and within bodies of scholarship. The conceptual vagueness poses a challenge to the accumulation of knowledge. To address this challenge, we integrate and expand existing work and develop an uncertainty grid to map phenomena (e.g., Covid-19; digitalization) or aspects thereof (e.g., vaccines; generative Artificial Intelligence [AI]). The uncertainty grid includes both the nature of a phenomenon’s uncertainty (epistemic and/or aleatory) and its level and enables labeling phenomena as certain, resolvably uncertain, or radically uncertain. We demonstrate the utility of the uncertainty grid by mapping the development of uncertainty during the Covid-19 pandemic onto it. Moreover, we discuss how researchers can use the grid to develop testable hypotheses regarding political elites’ behavior in response to uncertain phenomena.

Abstract Theoretical literature suggests at least three ways in which constitutional courts build social trust: democratic elements in the appointment of judges, technocratic qualities of the judges, and the impact of outcomes. This article contributes with empirical evidence to this theoretical debate. To do so, the article uses the case of Spain in the aftermath of the important ruling of the Constitutional Court on the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia. The findings of the research point at technocratic elements such as the perception of judicial independence being very relevant to explain trust in the court, unlike democratic elements such as the appointment of constitutional judges by elected politicians. Overall, the evidence presented by the article backs the general idea that de-politicization and increased technocratic qualities of constitutional courts would help them gain social trust.