Back to the future? Populism and the Legacies of Authoritarian Regimes
Back to the future? Populism and the Legacies of Authoritarian Regimes
Over the last decade, the populist radical right has surged across the world as one of the major threats to liberal democratic principles such as pluralism, media freedom, and minorities’ protection. Pundits noticed striking similarities between the current situation and the social unrest, economic crisis, and political instability that brought fascist regimes to power in the 1920s and 1930s. From Brazil to India, the United States and Hungary, populist radical right actors have been shaping national and international politics. Moreover, the populist radical right has become increasingly normalised, meaning that certain ideas, expressions and behaviours that were once ruled out as illegitimate — such as authoritarian tendencies that criticize rule of law, media freedom, separation of powers, independence of the judiciary system — have become socially acceptable by the general public. Going beyond generic predictions of the impending end of democracy as we know it, POLAR takes a new angle to understand the rise and normalisation of the radical right: analysing how the fading stigmatisation of the authoritarian past and the accommodative stance of the media contribute to lend legitimacy to radical Abstract for publication 9/22 right parties. Exploring a new avenue of research, POLAR seeks to examine if by using a populist rhetoric, the radical right has been able to distance itself from past authoritarian regimes, thus managing to be perceived as more legitimate by the media and the public. This is the crucial puzzle at the heart of POLAR: how can we explain the normalisation of the populist radical right? With democratic countries backsliding towards authoritarianism and populist radical right parties becoming increasingly successful in elections even in countries that were considered immune to the radical right, it is crucial to understand why the stigma associated with past authoritarian regimes no longer seems to serve as an antidote to the populist radical right. Building on existing strands of literature on authoritarian legacies, populism, and the far right, this project advances our knowledge about current political trends by introducing three key innovations. First, POLAR offers a refined conceptualisation and measure of the stigmatisation of the authoritarian past. Second, it connects populist attitudes and stigmatisation of the authoritarian past in a systematic and explicit way. Third, it studies whether different media strategies contribute to the normalisation of the far right in the public sphere. POLAR will first develop a conceptual framework of the links between populism and authoritarianism. Following a systematic literature review and an analytical account of the relationship between populist and authoritarian values, we will create a measure of the stigmatisation of past authoritarian regimes that can be implemented in an online survey. This measure will be twofold: first, an observational measure (we assume that this will comprise a battery of around 5 survey items), and second, an experimental design to test whether past authoritarian regimes are more stigmatised than contemporary far right populist actors. We will then field a representative online survey in Spain and Portugal, covering 3000 respondents in total, and including the new measure, the survey experiment, as well as standard items capturing political attitudes and behaviour, including populist attitudes. The goal is to understand whether a low stigma of the authoritarian past is linked to populist attitudes, and if the strength of this relationship varies depending on the age of the respondents, to determine if the stigmatisation of the authoritarian past is fading and how this relates to holding populist views. Moreover, POLAR will perform a content analysis of newspaper articles to determine whether different media strategies contribute to the normalisation or the stigmatisation of the far right in the public sphere. In particular, the content analysis will measure to what extent radical right parties receive a positive, neutral or negative coverage, and if the fact of being labelled as populist rather than just radical right influences the coverage they receive. The content analysis will also reveal how the coverage of the radical right changed between the 1970s and now.
Populist radical right, authoritarian past, stigma, normalisation
Over the last decade, the populist radical right has surged across the world as one of the major threats to liberal democratic principles such as pluralism, media freedom, and minorities’ protection. Pundits noticed striking similarities between the current situation and the social unrest, economic crisis, and political instability that brought fascist regimes to power in the 1920s and 1930s. From Brazil to India, the United States and Hungary, populist radical right actors have been shaping national and international politics. Moreover, the populist radical right has become increasingly normalised, meaning that certain ideas, expressions and behaviours that were once ruled out as illegitimate — such as authoritarian tendencies that criticize rule of law, media freedom, separation of powers, independence of the judiciary system — have become socially acceptable by the general public. Going beyond generic predictions of the impending end of democracy as we know it, POLAR takes a new angle to understand the rise and normalisation of the radical right: analysing how the fading stigmatisation of the authoritarian past and the accommodative stance of the media contribute to lend legitimacy to radical Abstract for publication 9/22 right parties. Exploring a new avenue of research, POLAR seeks to examine if by using a populist rhetoric, the radical right has been able to distance itself from past authoritarian regimes, thus managing to be perceived as more legitimate by the media and the public. This is the crucial puzzle at the heart of POLAR: how can we explain the normalisation of the populist radical right? With democratic countries backsliding towards authoritarianism and populist radical right parties becoming increasingly successful in elections even in countries that were considered immune to the radical right, it is crucial to understand why the stigma associated with past authoritarian regimes no longer seems to serve as an antidote to the populist radical right. Building on existing strands of literature on authoritarian legacies, populism, and the far right, this project advances our knowledge about current political trends by introducing three key innovations. First, POLAR offers a refined conceptualisation and measure of the stigmatisation of the authoritarian past. Second, it connects populist attitudes and stigmatisation of the authoritarian past in a systematic and explicit way. Third, it studies whether different media strategies contribute to the normalisation of the far right in the public sphere. POLAR will first develop a conceptual framework of the links between populism and authoritarianism. Following a systematic literature review and an analytical account of the relationship between populist and authoritarian values, we will create a measure of the stigmatisation of past authoritarian regimes that can be implemented in an online survey. This measure will be twofold: first, an observational measure (we assume that this will comprise a battery of around 5 survey items), and second, an experimental design to test whether past authoritarian regimes are more stigmatised than contemporary far right populist actors. We will then field a representative online survey in Spain and Portugal, covering 3000 respondents in total, and including the new measure, the survey experiment, as well as standard items capturing political attitudes and behaviour, including populist attitudes. The goal is to understand whether a low stigma of the authoritarian past is linked to populist attitudes, and if the strength of this relationship varies depending on the age of the respondents, to determine if the stigmatisation of the authoritarian past is fading and how this relates to holding populist views. Moreover, POLAR will perform a content analysis of newspaper articles to determine whether different media strategies contribute to the normalisation or the stigmatisation of the far right in the public sphere. In particular, the content analysis will measure to what extent radical right parties receive a positive, neutral or negative coverage, and if the fact of being labelled as populist rather than just radical right influences the coverage they receive. The content analysis will also reveal how the coverage of the radical right changed between the 1970s and now.
