Cure, Poison or Placebo? The Consequences of Populist and Radical Party Success for Representative Democracy

Abstract

The spread and success of radical and populist parties has triggered a profound debate on the state of democracy. Not only are these parties described as the outcome of a democratic malaise in which democratic regimes had ceased to integrate, represent and engage all their citizens. At the same time, questions arose as to the consequences of these parties for existing representative democracies. Could radical and populist parties be a (partial) cure to the woes of established democracies? Or would they make the democratic malaise even worse, further poisoning an already sick patient? Could it be that these parties act like a placebo that exists because of the democratic malaise but does not actually change anything except for those who desperately want to believe in an effect? The contributions to this Special Issue address questions of the impact of radical and populist parties on representative democracy. This introduction systematise their findings along party functions and draws broader conclusions.

Dysfunctional democracy and political polarisation: the case of Poland

“…Giovannini and Wood 2022 ; Casal Bértoa and Rama 2020 ; Przeworski 2019 ). We can see the first research results linking the democratic crisis with a rise in anti-establishment or radical populist parties (Casal Bértoa and Rama 2020 ; Giebler and Werner 2020 ), weak economies and high income inequality (Dalio et al. 2017 ; Funke et al.…”

Positive Side Effects? The Impact of Populist Radical Right Parties in Government on the Media Visibility of the Austrian Parliament

“…Secondly, both left-and right-wing populist parties are expected to increase party system polarisation (e.g. Giebler and Werner, 2020) and hence the politicisation of concrete policies within parliament and beyond. The electoral success of PRRPs is crucially based on their focus on issues that other parties have so far failed to take up (like migration or European integration).…”

“…With the rise of populism across the world, debates already started several years ago about the potential consequences of the electoral successes of populist parties on the quality of democracy. The question of whether these consequences are primarily positive (Ta ¨nnsjo ¨, 1992) or negative (Urbinati, 1998;Giebler and Werner, 2020) remains open. Recent studies suggest that one answer to this question lies in the nature or characteristics of a specific political system (Ruth-Lovell et al, 2019) and in the status of populist parties within this system: populism in opposition may indeed have corrective effects on representative democracy.…”

The Western Populist Right in 2020: A Purported Clash Between the Public Good and Individual Rights

“…The Western Christian Populist Right Donald Trump's conquest of the Oval Office in 2016 spurred the growth of a flourishing literature investigating the growth of rightwing populist parties in western democracies. A specific current of these studies focuses on the role of Christian religion (Protestant or Catholic) in fostering support for what can be seen as a concerning renaissance of ethnocentrism and authoritarianism (Giebler and Werner 2020, Martì 2019, Migliori 2020, Rozell, 2018, Whitehead et al 2018.…”