Facing the populists: the effect of populist challengers on mainstream parties’ welfare state positions

Abstract:

This article investigates the effect of populists’ electoral success on European mainstream parties’ positions about the economic dimension and the social inclusiveness of the welfare state. Combining data from party manifestos with a Regression Discontinuity Design, this article finds that a populist party obtaining representation constitutes a supply-side mechanism inducing an adjustment over mainstream parties’ positions, independently from public opinion changes. After competing with a populist party, mainstream parties shift their positions in favor of a smaller and more exclusionary welfare state. In terms of programmatic distances, mainstream parties tend to converge with the populists on both the cultural and economic dimension of the welfare state issue.

Publications:

• A. Celico, M. Rode, I. Rodriguez-Carreño “Will the real populists please stand up? A machine learning index of party populism”, European Journal of Political Economy (2024). [Link]
• A. Celico, M. Rode, “Can we all be Denmark? The role of civic attitudes in welfare state reforms.” Empirica (2023): 1-39. [Link]
• A. Celico, M. Rode, “Populism, Majority Rule, and Economic Freedom.” EconomicFreedom of the World: 2023 Annual Report (Fraser Institute, 2023). [Link]