We propose new ways to measure populism, using the Manifesto Project Database (1960- 2019) as main source of data. We characterize the evolution of populism over 60 years and show empirically that it is significantly impacted by the skill-content of globalization. Specifically, imports of goods...

This paper explores the relationship between loneliness, trust, and populist voting across both extremes of the ideological spectrum. The contribution of this research is mainly two-fold. First, it considers different dimensions of loneliness and accounts for its predetermined component stemming...

Kuznets predicts an economy's return to low inequality once structural transformation has peaked. I explore some headwinds to falling inequality in developing countries given their thorough engagement in the globalized market Kuznets could not have foreseen. Headwinds include plutocrats' abuse...

Populist policies are known to generate a walking stick pattern of high output growth and low inflation followed by low growth and high inflation. Traditionally, researchers viewed this as resulting primarily from populist monetary and fiscal policies that ignore intertemporal budget...

Existing research has identified several economic and cultural determinants of populist voting. We focus on a related explanation: whether populist leaders are able to capitalize on a sense of distrust between individuals. There is currently limited causal evidence on the relationship between...

Existing research has identified several economic and cultural determinants of populist voting. We focus on a related explanation: whether populist leaders are able to capitalize on a sense of distrust between individuals. There is currently limited causal evidence on the relationship between...

Populist parties have grown rapidly in popularity in most European countries, and are increasingly common in government coalitions. Analyzing 183 populist parties in 33 European countries from 1980 to 2021, we estimate the average effect of being in government on election results. On average, we...

We evaluate how traditional parties may respond to populist parties on issues aligning with populist messages. During the 2020 Italian referendum on the reduction of members of Parliament, we conducted a large-scale field experiment, exposing 200 municipalities to nearly a million impressions of...

Populist movements increasingly challenge liberal Western market democracies. Populism can be explained only in part by phenomena like globalization and digitization producing winners and losers in economic terms. Growing feelings of alienation from the market-democratic system and the perceived...

Populists typically frame politics as a conflict between a corrupt elite and a virtuous people and are skeptical of institutional constraints, including those protecting freedom of expression, as they seek to control the public narrative. We ask to what extent de jure constitutional guarantees...

We study the communication strategies on Twitter/X of 367 political leaders in 21 countries, focusing on electoral competition between populists and non-populists. We measure polarization by the ease with which the leader can be classified as populist or not, conditional on his tweet. We find...

This paper reviews a growing body of theoretical and empirical research on Italian populism through a detailed examination of the Five Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle, M5S), focusing on its experience in municipal elections. Using a wide range of administrative and survey data, as well as...

Why are inefficient policies popular? One explanation is incomplete voter information. Evidence from survey experiments in Argentina points instead to inattention. The experiments explore voter evaluations of two anti-inflation policies, price controls and limits on monetary emission....

This paper reviews a growing body of theoretical and empirical research on Italian populism through a detailed examination of the Five Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle, M5S), focusing on its experience in municipal elections. Using a wide range of administrative and survey data, as well as...

Populist political movements frequently campaign on promises to rebuild domestic manufacturing and reverse perceived losses from globalization. This paper evaluates whether populist governments succeed in improving manufacturing performance once global trends are taken into account. Using a...

Populism is frequently described as a threat to constitutionalism, although some researchers emphasize that populists, too, draft, enforce, and derive legitimacy from constitutions. This chapter explains the theoretical foundations of these concerns and provides an overview of empirical evidence...

Populism is frequently described as a threat to constitutionalism, although some researchers emphasize that populists, too, draft, enforce, and derive legitimacy from constitutions. This chapter explains the theoretical foundations of these concerns and provides an overview of empirical evidence...

This paper identifies population aging as an important driver of populism using multilevel regression analysis on individuals from European countries between 2002 and 2019. Unlike individual aging, we focus on population- level demographic change measured by the old-age dependency ratio (OADR),...

Die Christlich-Soziale Union (CSU) nimmt im deutschen Parteienspektrum eine Sonderrolle ein. Einerseits sieht sie sich selbst als äußerste demokratische Rechte neben ihrer Schwesterpartei Christlich Demokratische Union (CDU), andererseits folgt sie als bayerische Regionalpartei, die seit der...

This article investigates the rise of populism in Poland, applying an interdisciplinary method, with political, social, and economic factors as the compound reason for the turn from liberalism towards populism. The methodology of the study is the exploratory analysis of research, historical...

Economic change over the past twenty years has rendered many individuals and territories vulnerable, leading to greater interpersonal and interterritorial inequality. This rising inequality is seen as a root cause of populism. Yet, there is no comparative evidence as to whether this discontent...

Populist parties recently have shaken Western democracies, yet there is no consensus regarding the characteristics of populist voters. By using large-scale surveys from four European countries (France, Germany, Spain, and the U.K.), we investigate individual determinants of populist voting. Our...

What characterizes regions where right‐wing populist parties are relatively successful? A prominent hypothesis proposed in the emerging “geography of discontent” literature claims that places that are “left behind” constitute a breeding ground for the rise of populism. We re‐examine...

This paper asks whether history should change the way in which economists and economic historians think about populism. We use Müller's definition, according to which populism is 'an exclusionary form of identity politics, which is why it poses a threat to democracy'. We make three historical...

For years, federal politicians from all established parties have categorically ruled out any cooperation with the Alternative for Germany (AfD), erecting a so-called "firewall" ("Brandmauer") against the party. Nevertheless, reports increasingly document instances where this firewall is eroding,...

Populist policies are known to generate a walking stick pattern of high output growth and low inflation followed by low growth and high inflation. Traditionally, researchers viewed this as resulting primarily from populist monetary and fiscal policies that ignore intertemporal budget...

This paper examines the role of populist narratives in local resistance to renewable energy projects in Germany. Using survey data and seven case studies of wind energy and grid expansion projects across diverse geographical and socio-economic contexts, the study analyzes the arguments and...

Dieser Aufsatz analysiert die Eskalationsdynamik zwischen Populismus "von unten" und Anti-Populismus "von oben". Populisten beschimpfen Eliten im Namen des Volkes, wo- rauf Anti-Populisten mit Gegenbeschimpfung reagieren. Beide Bewegungen verstärken sich in einer toxischen Symbiose, die...

We study how far-right mass rallies affect people’s views about a city and thus location choices of nationals. To this end, we first exploit that the city of Dresden (Germany) unexpectedly experienced such rallies at the turn of the year 2014/15. Results from dyadic difference-in-differences...