Populist Campaigns Research Articles

Populism as a Factor of Destabilisation in Consolidated Democracies

Abstract This study offers a discussion of the dangers to the stability of political systems in consolidated democracies posed by contemporary populism, with a particular focus on the dynamic development of extreme right-wing populism. The author considers the consequences of efficient populist campaigns, such as Brexit in Great Britain, lowered trust towards the United States under Trump’s administration and practices followed by the Law and Justice party (PiS) under the leadership of Jarosław Kaczyński in Poland, which seem especially destructive for liberal democracy. Further examples are those of Hungary and Turkey, where the political systems have eroded into semi-consolidated democracy in the case of the former and an authoritarian system in the latter case. A comparative analysis of freedom indices indicates some dangers related to de-consolidation of the democratic system in Poland. Furthermore, the study points out dangers arising from the transformation of soft populism, understood as communication rhetoric oriented towards the concentration of power in the hands of populist leaders, which clearly paves the way for the dismantling of consolidated democracy in favour of an authoritarian system. The conclusions of the study outlines a variety of actions which can be undertaken to protect the achievements of liberal democracy.

Stuck in a Nativist Spiral: Content, Selection, and Effects of Right-Wing Populists’ Communication on Facebook

Although social media have become important venues for right-wing populist (RWP) campaigns, the content, selection, and effects of RWP messages on social media remain largely unknown. Using content and panel analysis in two studies, we investigated the potential reciprocal relationship between RWP communication on social media and citizens’ anti-immigrant attitudes, anti-elitist attitudes, and feelings of anger and anxiety. In Study 1, we analyzed 13,358 Facebook posts from German and Austrian political parties and their leading candidates. Among our results, RWP actors conveyed anti-immigrant and anti-elitist messages more often than non-RWP actors, and anti-immigrant messages especially induced negative emotional responses among followers of RWP actors. In Study 2, our analysis of data from a two-wave panel study with 559 respondents revealed that anti-immigrant attitudes drove selective exposure to RWP content on Facebook, which consequently fueled anti-immigrant attitudes, and that selective exposure to such content increased individuals’ anti-elitist attitudes and anxiety.

Denying Anthropogenic Climate Change: Or, How Our Rejection of Objective Reality Gave Intellectual Legitimacy to Fake News

The political rise of right‐wing populism in the United States, and elsewhere, has prompted a reexamination of theoretical perspectives that oscillate on an unequivocal rejection of objective reality. Indeed, populist campaigns that have acquired wide currency in the last few years have been ontologically predicated on the idea that there exists different “truths.” The premise of different truths has debunked any notion of an objective reality by rendering even the most reified of “facts” to be the outcome of individual subjectivities and ideological subscriptions. Donald Trump’s appeal to “fake news,” for instance, captures the implications that emerge when certain material “facts” become delegitimated in the public arena. The obfuscation of material facts through its entanglements in political discourse raises a timely question concerning theoretical resistance: How can objective reality retain its conceptual and analytical ideations without succumbing to the dangers that objective science historically created for socially marginalized subjects? Contextualizing the denial of anthropogenic climate change as an illustrative case, I answer this question by developing theoretical insights from critical realism and the notion of feminist objectivity. These insights accept the socially constructed nature of an objective reality but refute the idea of value‐free knowledge—that is, it disavows the claim that all representations of knowledge are equally valid and equally valuable.

The Politics of Housing

Owning a house is the most important economic choice most families will ever make. Yet, our understanding of the political causes and consequences of homeownership is rather thin. This review argues that political scientists need to take housing much more seriously, not least because of the unprecedented surges and collapses of house prices over the past two decades. The housing market is both a proxy for and a cause of growing social cleavages that shape how citizens view political issues from the size of the welfare state to the attractiveness of populist campaigns. The article begins by re-examining classic work on property from the nineteenth century as a still-relevant guide to the winners and losers from property market shocks and regulations. It then turns to the postwar era and work that suggests that the welfare state and property ownership are in some sense substitutes. It concludes by examining the role housing plays in shaping contemporary political preferences, both as a direct measure of individuals' wealth and welfare and as a proxy for the relative fortunes of different places.

Why Insurgent Campaigns Rarely Win the Democratic Presidential Primary in the United States

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines insurgent as “one who acts contrary to the policies and decisions of one’s own political party.” In this paper, an “insurgent presidential campaign” is defined as the campaign of a candidate who did not have the support of the United States of America’s (U.S.) Democratic Party establishment. A “populist campaign” is a subset of an insurgent campaign, because although all populist campaigns are insurgent campaigns, not all insurgent campaigns are populist campaigns. This paper defines a “populist campaign” as one that seeks to mobilize an unrepresented segment of the population against an institution or government, usually in defense of the unrepresented. Whether left-wing or right-wing, populist candidates seek to unite the supposedly uncorrupt and unsophisticated unrepresented against supposedly corrupt dominant elites. Insurgent campaigns have rarely been successful in capturing the Democratic Party presidential nomination in the United States. Only three insurgent campaigns have been successful over the past 50 years: the campaigns of George McGovern in 1972, Jimmy Carter in 1976, and Barack Obama in 2008, all of which were populist campaigns. The paper analyzes U.S. presidential campaigns for the period 1968-2016; reviews books and academic literature; and makes conclusions concerning the success and failure of insurgent campaigns. Finally, the paper recommends ways in which future insurgent campaigns could be more successful.

Why Insurgent Campaigns Rarely Win the Democratic Presidential Primary in the United States

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines insurgent as “one who acts contrary to the policies and decisions of one’s own political party.” In this paper, an “insurgent presidential campaign” is defined as the campaign of a candidate who did not have the support of the United States of America’s (U.S.) Democratic Party establishment. A “populist campaign” is a subset of an insurgent campaign, because although all populist campaigns are insurgent campaigns, not all insurgent campaigns are populist campaigns. This paper defines a “populist campaign” as one that seeks to mobilize an unrepresented segment of the population against an institution or government, usually in defense of the unrepresented. Whether left-wing or right-wing, populist candidates seek to unite the supposedly uncorrupt and unsophisticated unrepresented against supposedly corrupt dominant elites. Insurgent campaigns have rarely been successful in capturing the Democratic Party presidential nomination in the United States. Only three insurgent campaigns have been successful over the past 50 years: the campaigns of George McGovern in 1972, Jimmy Carter in 1976, and Barack Obama in 2008, all of which were populist campaigns. The paper analyzes U.S. presidential campaigns for the period 1968-2016; reviews books and academic literature; and makes conclusions concerning the success and failure of insurgent campaigns. Finally, the paper recommends ways in which future insurgent campaigns could be more successful.

Interdisciplinary Approaches to Emotions in Politics and International Relations

The ‘emotional turn’ within the social sciences and humanities attracts increasing scholarly attention. Political Science, traditionally emphasising the ‘rational’ public sphere rather than the ‘emotional’ private sphere, has increasingly questioned this dichotomisation, identifying broader political concepts and practices. The international political process—frequently characterised by widespread distrust, populist campaigns and extreme rhetoric—necessitates addressing and examining its underlying emotions. Informal, affective manifestations of politics are enormously influential, profoundly shaping inter- and intra-national democracy; they accordingly require interdisciplinary study. This thematic issue of <em>Politics and Governance</em> includes disciplines as diverse as education, history, international relations, political theory, psychology, and sociology. In doing so, we illustrate that emotions are cross-disciplinary concerns, relevant beyond the study of politics.

Fear and Loathing in Populist Campaigns? Comparing the Communication Style of Populists and Non-populists in Elections Worldwide

Populists are often described as using a more aggressive, offensive, and anxiety-fuelled rhetoric than non-populists. Yet, little systematic evidence exists that this is the case. This article presents the first large-scale systematic study comparing the communication style of populists and non-populists worldwide, and introduces an original dataset based on expert ratings. The dataset contains systematic information for 195 candidates having competed in 40 national elections worldwide between June 2016 and June 2017. Results highlight that, controlling for “usual suspects” that drive negativity and emotional campaigns, populist campaigns are 15% more negative and contain 11% more character attacks and 8% more fear messages than campaigns of non-populist candidates.

The State as a Firm: Understanding the Autocratic Roots of Technocratic Populism

Why, when, and how does populism emerge in a stable democracy? This article investigates the political logic and ideological appeal of a rarely explored form of populism: technocratic populism. Technocratic populism uses the appeal of technical expertise to connect directly with the people, promising to run the state as a firm, while at the same time delegitimizing political opponents and demobilizing the electorate by instilling civic apathy. Technocratic populism is an anti-elite ideology that exploits competence to create the appearance of authenticity and proximity to ordinary people. It is less exclusionary than nativist or economic forms of populisms and its broad appeal is therefore arguably more threatening to representative democracy. In order to understand the appeal of technocratic populism, as well as why it arises at critical junctures when dominant ideologies are in turmoil, we argue that one must not ignore its historical roots, which shows that it transcends both regime changes and the traditional left–right divide. The article develops and examines these points using evidence from communist-era populist campaigns against “elitist” dissidents (from Charter 77) in the Czech Republic, and demonstrates how post-1989 politicians have exploited and also adapted ideas and strategies from the authoritarian past for the new democratic setting. The article highlights the adaptive character of technocratic populism across political regimes.

МЕНЯЮЩИЙСЯ РЕЛИГИОЗНЫЙ ЛАНДШАФТ АМЕРИКИ

The article presents an analysis of the main trends in America’s changing religious landscape at the beginning of the 21st century. It is based on recent sociological studies and survey research conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute and Pew Research, most notably – PRRI’s report “America’s Changing Religious Identity. Findings from the 2016 American Values Atlas”. These trends are: 1) decline of white Christian America (especially Protestants); 2) growth of non-white Christians and non-Christian religions; 3) rise of religiously unaffiliated. There has been an acceleration of secularization process in recent years caused by such long-term trends as rising levels of urbanization and education, deep changes in racial/ ethnic composition of the U.S. population under impact of immigration, and decline of traditional values eroded by post-modern liberalism. Also consequential were specific policies of Obama’s administration promoting greater equality in race and gender relations. The emergence of “white nativism” was a natural reaction of white Christian America to the loss of its majority status, being enhanced by decline of living standards of the white working class. This movement was energized by the white populist campaign of Donald Trump and provided him with a narrow margin of victory. As a President, Trump stuck to his white Christian base (Evangelicals in particular) which remains his most loyal source of support. The decline of white Christian America has had a strong impact on the Democratic and Republican parties widening the value gap between them. Various Protestant denominations choose different strategies in response to their growing marginalization: from adapting to the increasingly liberal cultural mainstream to actively resisting it by all means including political ones. The American style secularization process still retains its combination of high institutional religiosity with creeping dissipation of dogmatic and moral foundations. Yet, given the ongoing social and cultural transformations along with the manifest generational dynamics, a further dissolution of the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) centrality in American life looks irreversible and would have grave implications for the national identity.&nbsp

Donald Trump, perceptions of justice, and populism

The populism of Donald Trump and his supporters can be viewed as rooted in feelings of relative deprivation, whereby people feel that they are getting less than they deserve in exchanges with other groups, and perceptions of unfair procedures, whereby elites are seen to allocate outcomes in an unethical, biased, and/or disrespectful manner. Populist leaders can boost people’s self-esteem and hence their sense of what they deserve and how they should be treated by establishment decision makers. Populist leaders make intergroup comparisons salient and thereby exacerbate intergroup hostility. In the United States, populist politics has shifted from emphasizing unfair economic outcomes to exploiting racist and nativist sentiments as well as cultural antagonisms. Donald Trump’s populism can be traced most directly to George Wallace’s racist populist campaigns in the 1960s. Trump has also focused on unfair decisions made about political allies. His presidency is arguably the first to ride these elements in American politics to the White House.

Reluctant to Reform? A Note on Risk-Loving Politicians and Bureaucrats

Abstract From a political economy perspective, politicians often fail to implement structural reforms. In this contribution we investigate if the resistance to reform is based on the differences in the risk preferences of voters, politicians, and bureaucrats. Based on three surveys among the German electorate, 175 members of the Federal German Parliament and 106 officials from German ministries, this is not the case. Since both politicians and bureaucrats have a higher risk appetite than the voters, their risk preferences cannot be seen as an explanation for the resistance to structural reform. Hence, it must be caused by other reasons. These could be interventions by veto players, wars of attrition by powerful interest groups, or reform logjams initiated. However, as during times of populist campaigns, the election process can put forth candidates with very high risk appetites, the constitutions of democracies turn out to be rather effective if hazardous actions and measures by political rookies and gamblers are inhibited by checks and balances.

Reluctant to Reform? A Note on Risk-Loving Politicians and Bureaucrats

As from a political economy perspective, politicians often fail to implement structural reforms, we investigate if the resistance to reform is based on the differences in the risk preferences of voters, politicians, and bureaucrats. Based on the empirical results of a survey of the population in Germany, 175 members of the Federal German Parliament (Bundestag), and 106 officials (“bureaucrats”) from German ministries, this is not the case. Since both politicians and bureaucrats have a higher risk appetite than the general population, their risk preferences cannot be seen as an explanation for the resistance to structural reform. Hence, it must be caused by other reasons. These can be for instance – as public choice scholars argue – interventions by veto players, wars of attrition by powerful interest groups, or reform logjams initiated. However, another point of view could be that modern democracies are doing better than many believe. During times of populist campaigns, the election process can put forth candidates with very high risk appetites, but the constitutions of democracies turn out to be rather smart if hazardous actions and measures by political rookies and gamblers are inhibited by checks and balances.

White Supremacism and Racial Conflict in the Trump Era

ABSTRACTThe white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in August 2017 was one of the largest to occur in the United States during recent decades, and mirrored the severe social and racial conflicts of the Trump era. The re-emergence of white supremacism and of intensified racial conflict has profound historical sources, while also being driven by practical causes. First, white supremacism is deeply rooted in the racial discrimination that has been present throughout American history. Second, white supremacism mirrors the economic downturn and widened wealth disparity now characterizing American society. Third, white supremacism is reinforced politically by the dominant role of extreme conservatives. Fourth, Trump’s populist campaign proposals promoted white supremacism. The deterioration of racial relations is an inevitable consequence of the complex, systematic and enduring racial discrimination present in American society. Racial minorities experience discrimination as part of the political, economic, law enforcement, and judicial aspects of their daily lives. Although the United States has abolished slavery and undergone the experience of the civil rights movement, the genes of racial discrimination remain at various levels, despite some degree of suppression. Racial relationships in the United States cannot be improved without fundamental transformations, or even revolutions, in areas such as the political structure and in the economic and ideological systems.

Asia-Pacific: Duterte’s drug war: Violating rights for a quick fix

Strongman President Duterte of the Philippines was elected on populist campaign promises that included modernisation and a war on drugs. Thousands of drug suspects have been killed without legal process in a campaign of illegal police or vigilante human rights violations that look like state terror. It is a short-term attempt to deal with symptoms, not the causes, of illegal drug usage – such as poverty, inequality and exclusive growth.

DEMOCRACY VS. POPULISM: THE TRANSFORMATION OF POLITICS IN NIGERIA?

Since the return of electoral democracy to Nigeria in 1999, two of the four elected presidents have been former military dictators who have stressed anti-corruption and national security policies in populist campaigns. As military dictators in previous years, they had instigated regimes that had practiced stern military discipline; as populists they have leaned toward these two policies. Reactions to civilian corruption and threats to national security have represented the primary military rationales for military intervention in the past. A popular vote in 2015 for former military dictator General Muhammadu Buhari seems to have represented a continuing preference for populism over democracy. We will examine the new populism in Nigeria, complicated as it is by questions of ethnicity, religion and military identity, with a view to explaining the likely outcome of the first peaceful transference of power from one political party to another in Africa’s most populous country.

Online Antagonism of the Alt-Right in the 2016 Election

Buoyed by the populist campaign of Donald Trump, the “alt-right,” a loose political movement based around right-wing ideologies, emerged as an unexpected and highly contentious actor during the election cycle. The alt-right promoted controversy through provocative online actions that drew a considerable amount of media attention. This article focuses on the role of the “alt-right” in the 2016 election by examining its visual and rhetorical efforts to engage the political mainstream in relation to the campaigns of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. In particular, the alt-right’s unique style and internal jargon created notable confusion and also attracted interest by the media, while its promotional tactics included the use of social media and Internet memes, through which the movement came to epitomize online antagonism in the 2016 election.

Negative Stereotypical Portrayals of Muslims in Right-Wing Populist Campaigns: Perceived Discrimination, Social Identity Threats, and Hostility Among Young Muslim Adults

Anti-Islamic sentiments have become central to right-wing populist mobilization in Western societies, which often results in negative portrayals of Muslims in political campaigns. Although these portrayals may have detrimental effects on minority members' identity formation and attitudes toward majority members, little is known about their effects on members of the depicted group. A lab experiment with 145 young Muslims reveals that right-wing populist ad exposure increases perceived discrimination, which in turn decreases individuals' self-esteem and national identification, and encourages hostility toward majority members. Religious identification, in contrast, is not affected by ad exposure. Implications of these findings for intergroup relations and democratic processes are discussed.

Reluctant to Reform? A Note on Risk-Loving Politicians and Bureaucrats

As from a political economy perspective, politicians often fail to implement structural reforms, we investigate if the resistance to reform is based on the differences in the risk preferences of voters, politicians, and bureaucrats. Based on the empirical results of a survey of the population in Germany, 175 members of the Federal German Parliament (Bundestag), and 106 officials (“bureaucrats”) from German ministries, this is not the case. Since both politicians and bureaucrats have a higher risk appetite than the general population, their risk preferences cannot be seen as an explanation for the resistance to structural reform. Hence, it must be caused by other reasons. These can be for instance – as public choice scholars argue – interventions by veto players, wars of attrition by powerful interest groups, or reform logjams initiated. However, another point of view could be that modern democracies are doing better than many believe. During times of populist campaigns, the election process can put forth candidates with very high risk appetites, but the constitutions of democracies turn out to be rather smart if hazardous actions and measures by political rookies and gamblers are inhibited by checks and balances.

Introduction

Introduction Becky K. Becker (bio) Globalization is nothing new. We need only look to the ancient Silk Road linking the Far East to the Mediterranean in order to find some of the earliest recorded impacts of people and goods crossing borders. Yet in the current cultural moment, tensions are high due to increased migration, economic unpredictability, complicated acts of local and global terror, and heightened political divisions all over the world. Because it is the moment in which we are living, it is all too easy to perceive globalization as "new" and therefore a threat to our ways of life, to our nations, and to our cultures. Britain's unexpected vote to leave the European Union in June 2016 is just one indicator—albeit a stunning one—of the degree to which individuals, communities, and nation-states are concerned about the impacts of border crossings, cross-cultural relationships, and the global economy. The current response to globalization is nothing new either. Like the ebb and flow of time, our awareness, understanding, and valuing of cross-cultural relationships fluctuate according to the cultural climate in which they are shaped. For example, if we look at the lead-up to World War I in Europe, many of the tensions we are currently experiencing may feel like echoes of that time. Similarly, a bit closer to home, the rhetoric of the 2016 presidential election, and unexpected win for Donald Trump, is reminiscent of previous populist campaigns and, more specifically, the cultural climate in the United States in 1968, with all its divisiveness and volatility. Despite decades of perceived growth and change, ostensibly impacted by such historical markers as the civil rights movement, the women's movement, the Vietnam War, the Korean War, the Gulf War, 9/11, and subsequent crises in the Middle East that are ongoing, we find ourselves in a time of increased division and skepticism toward migrants and refugees, global economic and political relationships, and our ability to find solutions to both international and domestic problems. Contributing to this divide is the increased rate at which information is dispersed. While it means that we can be informed more quickly of significant events and movements across the world, there is also a risk of media [End Page 5] saturation, false information, and our immediate ability to share knee-jerk responses to complex social and cultural issues that cannot be meaningfully communicated in 140 characters or less. For example, accusations have been directed toward Black Lives Matter here in the United States for being too politically correct in their responses to the "All Lives Matter" counter-campaign. Yet, rather than perceiving Black Lives Matter as a necessary response to police violence and high incarceration rates that specifically target people of color in the United States, "All Lives Matter" works as a means to minimize the lived experiences of African Americans and oversimplify or dilute the dialogue. The perceived political correctness that emerged during the US cultural and identity revolution of the 1990s is passed off as being weak and unfair rather than acknowledging its original intent: increased cultural sensitivity and thoughtful dialogue. Cultural moments such as this one are a stark reminder that for some, empathetic and sensitive communication unnecessarily detracts from the power of the dominant culture. Perhaps even more disturbing, it seems to be a strategy to curtail cross-cultural dialogue that acknowledges complexity. When right-wing politicians characterize all refugees and migrants as potential terrorists, denigrating their liberal counterparts for refusing to use the term "radical Islamic terrorist," the strategy is to deny complexity and, more poignantly, to portray such attempts at cultural sensitivity as being "weak on terror." In one fell swoop a serious global issue—increased migration due to civil unrest, ongoing wars, dwindling resources, climate change, and, in some instances, terrorism—impacting millions of innocent people, is reduced to its most politically charged component. Cultural sensitivity, by association, is perceived to be a bad idea, signifying weakness. Meaningful cross-cultural dialogue that is sensitive to our shared histories, cultures, and perceived differences is reduced to pandering by those who would make a mockery of it. Dialogue becomes impossible. Saying anything becomes too great a risk. At...