Politische Raumkultur als Verstärker der Corona-Pandemie? Einflussfaktoren auf die regionale Inzidenzentwicklung in Deutschland in der ersten und zweiten Pandemiewelle 2020

Richter, Christoph; Wächter, Maximilian; Reinecke, Jost; Salheiser, Axel; Quent, Matthias

doi:10.3224/zrex.v1i2.01

Cited by 12 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…Socio-economic factors such as income, wealth, and education have been spotted as fundamental causes of a wide range of health outcomes (1). However, within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers' attentions have additionally been drawn to socio-behavioral aspects and political attitudes as crucial predictors of the pandemic activity (8)(9)(10)(11). Recently, within this latter context of COVID-19, migration background has been suggested to constitute an additional risk factor for SARS-CoV-2 infection (5) due to, e.g., social isolation and mistrust of the health system.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Previous analyses of socioeconomic determinants of COVID-19 incidences (and fatalities) exist for other countries like the USA (6) or Austria (12), however, the results might not be applicable to Germany. Other studies have been conducted at an early pandemic phase and need to be updated to the recent epidemic activity (3,4,11). In references (3,4), a single aggregated parameter, the so called German Index of Socio-economic Deprivation (GISD), has been used as a predictor for COVID-19 incidence.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Local socio-structural predictors of COVID-19 incidence in Germany

Qamar

Gronwald

Timmesfeld

et al. 2022

Front. Public Health

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Socio-economic conditions and social attitudes are known to represent epidemiological determinants. Credible knowledge on socio-economic driving factors of the COVID-19 epidemic is still incomplete. Based on linear random effects regression, an ecological model is derived to estimate COVID-19 incidence in German rural/urban districts from local socio-economic factors and popularity of political parties in terms of their share of vote. Thereby, records provided by Germany's public health institute (Robert Koch Institute) of weekly notified 7-day incidences per 100,000 inhabitants per district from the outset of the epidemic in 2020 up to December 1, 2021, are used to construct the dependent variable. Local socio-economic conditions including share of votes, retrieved from the Federal Statistical Office of Germany, have been used as potential risk factors. Socio-economic parameters like per capita income, proportions of protection seekers and social benefit claimants, and educational level have negligible impact on incidence. To the contrary, incidence significantly increases with population density and we observe a strong association with vote shares. Popularity of the right-wing party Alternative for Germany (AfD) bears a considerable risk of increasing COVID-19 incidence both in terms of predicting the maximum incidences during three epidemic periods (alternatively, cumulative incidences over the periods are used to quantify the dependent variable) and in a time-continuous sense. Thus, districts with high AfD popularity rank on top in the time-average regarding COVID-19 incidence. The impact of the popularity of the Free Democrats (FDP) is markedly intermittent in the course of time showing two pronounced peaks in incidence but also occasional drops. A moderate risk emanates from popularities of the Green Party (GRÜNE) and the Christian Democratic Union (CDU/CSU) compared to the other parties with lowest risk level. In order to effectively combat the COVID-19 epidemic, public health policymakers are well-advised to account for social attitudes and behavioral patterns reflected in local popularities of political parties, which are conceived as proper surrogates for these attitudes. Whilst causal relations between social attitudes and the presence of parties remain obscure, the political landscape in terms of share of votes constitutes at least viable predictive “markers” relevant for public health policy making.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Local socio-structural predictors of COVID-19 incidence in Germany

Qamar

Gronwald

Timmesfeld

et al. 2022

Front. Public Health

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“… 34 For instance, German regions with more right-wing voters or US regions with more individualistic values reported higher infection rates, because people adhered less to NPIs. 35 36 Furthermore, we experienced significant dropout over time that resulted in small sample sizes in the respective countries. Even though dropout rates of 40% or more are a reality in longitudinal research, 37 these can compromise the internal validity of our findings.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How national leaders keep ‘us’ safe: A longitudinal, four-nation study exploring the role of identity leadership as a predictor of adherence to COVID-19 non-pharmaceutical interventions

et al. 2022

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ObjectivesTo investigate whether citizens’ adherence to health-protective non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) during the COVID-19 pandemic is predicted by identity leadership, wherein leaders are perceived to create a sense of shared national identity.DesignObservational two-wave study. Hypotheses testing was conducted with structural equation modelling.SettingData collection during the COVID-19 pandemic in China, Germany, Israel and the USA in April/May 2020 and four weeks later.ParticipantsAdults in China (n=548, 66.6% women), Germany (n=182, 78% women), Israel (n=198, 51.0% women) and the USA (n=108, 58.3% women).MeasuresIdentity leadership (assessed by the four-item Identity Leadership Inventory Short-Form) at Time 1, perceived shared national identification (PSNI; assessed with four items) and adherence to health-protective NPIs (assessed with 10 items that describe different health-protective interventions; for example, wearing face masks) at Time 2.ResultsIdentity leadership was positively associated with PSNI (95% CI 0.11 to 0.30, p<0.001) in all countries. This, in turn, was related to more adherence to health-protective NPIs in all countries (95% CI 0.03 to 0.36, 0.001≤p≤0.017) except Israel (95% CI −0.03 to 0.27, p=0.119). In Germany, the more people saw Chancellor Merkel as engaging in identity leadership, the more they adhered to health-protective NPIs (95% CI 0.04 to 0.18, p=0.002). In the USA, in contrast, the more people perceived President Trump as engaging in identity leadership, the less they adhered to health-protective NPIs (95% CI −0.17 to −0.04, p=0.002).ConclusionsNational leaders can make a difference by promoting a sense of shared identity among their citizens because people are more inclined to follow health-protective NPIs to the extent that they feel part of a united ‘us’. However, the content of identity leadership (perceptions of what it means to be a nation’s citizen) is essential, because this can also encourage people to disregard such recommendations.

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“…Recent research has found that AfD strongholds in eastern and western Germany in the 2017 election are also the counties that have been hit especially hard by the pandemic (Richter et al. 2021 ). This is in line with our finding, as we can show that a certain number of voters in these affected regions will withdraw their support, while a considerable number will continue to support the AfD and also probably not strictly comply with public health regulations (see also Gollwitzer et al.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Support for the German AfD: Jumping the Populist Ship or Staying the Course?

Bayerlein

Metten

2022

Polit Vierteljahresschr

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Populist parties enjoy stable support in various European countries. The literature on the rise of populism argues that this support especially increases in times of crises. Surprisingly, the German right-wing populist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) did not increase its support in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the party even lost 2.3 percentage points in the 2021 federal election. We address this puzzle and ask why the AfD has not been able to use the crisis to its advantage. Our main argument in answering this question is that, although the AfD pursued the classic populist strategy of fundamental opposition, the support base of the AfD is strongly divided on the preference towards measures containing the spread of COVID-19. This division is reinforced by individual affectedness by the pandemic. Introducing a novel weekly dataset on voter preferences, we show that the AfD support base is strongly divided on the issue with approval of the government measures being a significant and substantial contributor to vote switching away from the AfD. Using regional-level data and a difference-in-differences approach, we further show that western German regions hit especially hard by the pandemic display a lower AfD vote share than other regions. Our findings have important implications for the impact of exogenous shocks on electoral competition and also on the future of populist parties.

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Politische Raumkultur als Verstärker der Corona-Pandemie? Einflussfaktoren auf die regionale Inzidenzentwicklung in Deutschland in der ersten und zweiten Pandemiewelle 2020

Cited by 12 publications

References 25 publications

Local socio-structural predictors of COVID-19 incidence in Germany

Local socio-structural predictors of COVID-19 incidence in Germany

How national leaders keep ‘us’ safe: A longitudinal, four-nation study exploring the role of identity leadership as a predictor of adherence to COVID-19 non-pharmaceutical interventions

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Support for the German AfD: Jumping the Populist Ship or Staying the Course?

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