Does counter‐mobilization contain right‐wing populist movements? Evidence from Germany

Abstract

Right-wing populist (RWP) movements have been on the rise in Western democracies. Outside of party politics, such movements regularly organize demonstrations against political elites and minority groups. At the same time, civil society coalitions have mobilized against these movements. Yet we know little about the effect of counter-demonstrations on RWP protest activities. We derive competing theoretical expectations from previous work. On the one hand, counter-mobilization reduces mobilization because the original movement is less likely to achieve its goals (expected utility/costs). On the other hand, clashes and standoffs between opposing movements facilitate mobilization through polarization and anger (identity/emotions). We empirically analyze movementcountermovement dynamics using a new city-level event dataset on street protests by the German Pegida movement and its opponents. In our quantitative analysis, we investigate how countermobilization is associated with the onset of Pegida protests, their intensity in terms of participant numbers, and their demobilization. Counter-mobilization does not prevent protest onset, but large This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved. counter-demonstrations are associated with larger subsequent Pegida protests, and violence against Pegida supporters reduces the likelihood that they will stop protesting.

Contesting neoliberalism: Mapping the terrain of social conflict

“…These were largely organised by the Pegida movement in opposition to the arrival of refugees from Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East and North Africa (Virchow 2016). This Pegida movement was met by a wave of counter-demonstrations, which we label here 'racialised minorities and supporters', who sought to oppose Pegida (Vüllers & Hellmeier 2021). This conflict saw an overlap between concerns focused on Germany's border regime and its wage-labour nexus.…”

Scared Straight? Threat and Assimilation of Refugees in Germany

“…This is consistent with the negative relationship between refugee inflows and (changes in) locals' attitudes and behavior in more threatening areas documented above. An alternative interpretation is that the stronger hostility prevailing in high-threat regions led some locals and non-profit organizations to coordinate e↵orts to facilitate the cultural integration of refugees (Vüllers & Hellmeier, 2021).…”

Group Size and Protest Mobilization across Movements and Countermovements

“…The theoretical ambivalence underlines the need to empirically tease apart strategic interdependence within and across political movements. While movement–countermovement dynamics have received scholarly attention (Andrews 2002; Jennings and Andersen 1996; Lohmann, 1994; Tarrow, 1996a; Vann 2018), the existing evidence is largely correlational and does not rely on individual-level data on protest behavior. Aggregated data, in particular, present a serious challenge because they do not allow the researcher to understand the decision making of individual supporters when faced with an opposing movement.…”

“…The decision to become active—whether on the political right or left—is primarily driven by dynamics within supporters’ own movement. This is not to say that there is no strategic interdependence between opposing movements (see, e.g., Vann 2018). However, our findings imply that turnout at the protest of the opposing movement is not the relevant margin along which potential activists decide whether to take to the streets, at least in the case of right-wing protests and counterprotests in Germany.…”

“…Second, we contribute to a debate on the causes of participation within a given movement (Amenta 2006; Han 2016; McClendon 2014; McVeigh, Cunningham, and Farrell 2014; Vüllers and Hellmeier 2021). When focusing on dynamics within movements, our evidence points to turnout levels at one’s own protest as a salient driver of intended and actual engagement.…”