<i>Who</i> Supports Populism and <i>What</i> Attracts People to It?

Spruyt, Bram; Keppens, Gil Antoine; Droogenbroeck, Filip Van

doi:10.1177/1065912916639138

Cited by 417 publications

(354 citation statements)

References 42 publications

(56 reference statements)

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“…with the programmes of the parties and the discourses of the leaders (see Hawkins 2009;Rooduijn 2013). However, recent research has also identified populist attitudes among voters Hawkins et al 2012;Spruyt et al 2016). The distinction between elites and the people and the notion that sovereignty should lie not with the elites but with the people are also found among the supporters of populist parties.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Gender, populist attitudes, and voting: explaining the gender gap in voting for populist radical right and populist radical left parties

Spierings

Zaslove

2017

West European Politics

133

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Empirical studies have demonstrated that compared to almost all other parties, populist radical right (PRR) parties draw more votes from men than from women. However, the two dominant explanations that are generally advanced to explain this disparity -gender differences regarding socio-economic position and lower perceptions regarding the threat of immigrants -cannot fully explain the difference. The article contends that it might actually be gender differences regarding the conceptualisation of society and politics -populist attitudesthat explain the gender gap. Thus, the gap may be due, in part, to differences in socialisation. The article analyses EES 2014 data on voting for the populist radical right and the populist radical left in nine European countries. Across countries, the gender gap in voting for the PRR is indeed partly explained by populist attitudes. For populist radical left parties, the results are less clear, suggesting that populism has different meanings to voters on the left and on the right. KEYWORDS populism; gender gap; voting behaviour; populist radical right; left-wing populism; europeThe electoral success of populist parties does not seem to subside. In fact, it appears that the opposite is true: in addition to the continuing success of populist radical right parties (PRR), in recent years, there has also been a surge in populist (radical) left parties. Recent examples include Podemos in Spain, SYRIZA in Greece, Movimento 5 Stelle in Italy, 1 the Dutch Socialistische Partij, and Die Linke in Germany. The continued, and perhaps even growing, success of populist parties presents us with an interesting question: why do voters continue to support populist parties?CONTACT niels spierings n.spierings@maw.ru.nl OPEN ACCESS 822 N. SPIERINGS AND A. ZASLOVEResearch in the last 10 to 15 years has provided answers to this question. Reasons for the support for the populist radical right are found in opposition to immigration (e.g. Immerzeel 2015;Lubbers et al. 2002;Norris 2005;Spierings and Zaslove 2015b), lower levels of trust in political institutions (Norris 2005) and being less well educated, younger, and male (Harteveld et al. 2015;Immerzeel 2015;Spierings and Zaslove 2015b). In contrast, supporters of the populist radical left are marginally more supportive of economic equality than supporters of other parties (Visser et al. 2014). The socio-economic profile of (populist) radical left parties is, however, less clear. Visser et al. (2014) show that those with lower incomes and those who are unemployed are more likely to possess a radical left ideology. Ramiro (2016) finds that those who identify with the working class are more likely to support radical left parties. Education is, however, more complicated: both less well and more highly educated voters are attracted to the radical left (Ramiro 2016). Nevertheless, there is a quality that the populist radical right and populist left parties have in common: their populist attitudes .Despite our growing knowledge of why voters support the ...

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confidence: 99%

Gender, populist attitudes, and voting: explaining the gender gap in voting for populist radical right and populist radical left parties

Spierings

Zaslove

2017

West European Politics

133

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“…Substantial susceptibility to populist arguments also results from the growing inequalities and uncontrolled actions of owners of supranational capital which is poorly controlled by the national elites [15]. The dissemination of information and ideas incompatible with the conventional way of thinking is frightening to citizens.…”

Section: Why There Is Susceptibility To Populist Arguments?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…• The leader along with his closest collaborators formulate a specific populist program of social change (political, electoral program) [14,15].…”

Section: Repeating Sequence Of Eventsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Populist Upheavals: What can we do?

Brodziak¹,

Różyk-Myrta²,

Wolińska³

2017

J Gerontol Geriatr Res

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“…Mudde, 2010;Kriesi, 2014;Spruyt et al, 2016). Eribon (2013) and others have suggested that by voting for populist parties, the modern precariat aims to defend their collective identity.…”

Section: Third Modernity and Practices Of Simulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In respect of modernization theory, populist movements are commonly conceptualized as an explicitly anti-modernist phenomenon, specific to the contemporary era of 'regressive modernity' (Inglehart and Norris, 2017; see also Geiselberger, 2017) and typically mobilizing the losers of modernization (Oliver and Rahn, 2016;Spruyt et al, 2016). From this perspective, the proliferation of populism then appears either as a response to rising levels of economic inequality as described by Piketty (2014) and Milanovic (2016), or as a 'cultural backlash' by social strata that have not moved along with the modernization-induced shift towards cosmopolitan liberal value orientations (Inglehart and Norris, 2016).…”

Section: Towards a Shift Of Perspectivementioning

confidence: 99%

Rethinking Populism: Peak democracy, liquid identity and the performance of sovereignty

Blühdorn

Butzlaff

2018

European Journal of Social Theory

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Despite the burgeoning literature on right-wing populism, there is still considerable uncertainty about its causes, its impact on liberal democracies and about promising counter-strategies. Inspired by recent suggestions that (1) the emancipatory left has made a significant contribution to the proliferation of the populist right; and (2) populist movements, rather than challenging the established socio-political order, in fact stabilize and further entrench its logic, this article argues that an adequate understanding of the populist phenomenon necessitates a radical shift of perspective: beyond the democratic and emancipatory norms, which still govern most of the relevant literature. Approaching its subject matter via democratic theory and modernization theory, it undertakes a reassessment of the triangular relationship between modernity, democracy and populism. It finds that the latter is not helpfully conceptualized as anti-modernist or antidemocratic but should, instead, be regarded as a predictable feature of the form of politics distinctive of today's third modernity.

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Who Supports Populism and What Attracts People to It?

Cited by 417 publications

References 42 publications

Gender, populist attitudes, and voting: explaining the gender gap in voting for populist radical right and populist radical left parties

Gender, populist attitudes, and voting: explaining the gender gap in voting for populist radical right and populist radical left parties

Populist Upheavals: What can we do?

Rethinking Populism: Peak democracy, liquid identity and the performance of sovereignty

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