The rise of nationalist and populist candidates worldwide provides compelling evidence that parties win elections, not by appealing to voters’ policy preferences alone, but rather by connecting those preferences to group identities. This state-of-the-field article argues that party scholars need to integrate constructivist insights from neighboring fields to better understand the role of group identities in party competition. We review recent demand- and supply-side studies on the role of group identities in elections and bring them into conversation with the literature on ethnic politics and nationalism and political economic models of identity politics. On this basis, we suggest a research agenda that models voters as having both policy preferences and desires for self-esteem and self-consistency, which are mediated by their identification with social groups. Voters want to benefit others they see as being similar to themselves, to raise the status of the groups they identify with, and to maintain self-consistency by narrowing the gap between themselves and members of groups with which they identify. Political parties strategically combine policy offers with group appeals to address – and shape – all these motivations. Shifting from a ‘policy-only’ towards a ‘policy-cum-identity’ paradigm will enable the field of party politics to better understand the dynamics of real-world electoral competition and to reconcile its models with the latest developments in the political theory of representation.

Around the globe, democracies have come under pressure. At the same time, one of the most prominent research areas in political science is the question of which democratic designs generate the most stability. However, so far, one inherent part of democracies has not received much attention in this literature: the opposition. Although research has shown that there is a wide range of power granted to oppositions, little research exists investigating the consequences of these institutional differences. In this research note, I focus on the importance of mutual toleration for democratic stability and argue that this might manifest in institutionalized legislative opposition power, which, in turn, might affect democratic stability. Preliminary results indicate that instances of democratic decline are more likely to occur in countries with weak institutionalization of opposition power. These results have important implications and open up avenues for future research on questions relating to determinants of democratic stability.

Previous research conducted in closed autocracies indicates that government propaganda can deter opposition, shift political attitudes, and influence emotions. Yet the specific mechanisms and contextual factors influencing how and when propaganda works remain unclear. We theorize how power-projecting government propaganda works differently for government supporters and opponents in polarized electoral authoritarian regimes, focusing on emotional reactions, sense of societal belonging, and downstream effects on contentious political behavior. Through two preregistered surveys in Turkey (N = 6,286), we find that supporters exposed to propaganda videos feel a greater sense of belonging and are more susceptible to engage in pro-government activities. Opponents report heightened anger and anxiety and seem deterred from protesting. However, the latter effect weakened during the highly contested 2023 electoral campaign. These results indicate that propaganda can help electoral authoritarian regimes deter anti-government action and encourage pro-government action, but that its deterrent effects may weaken during periods of high mobilization and contention.

Understanding the structure of citizens’ trust in state institutions is essential for assessing its role in sustaining healthy, legitimate democracies. While research has revealed a puzzling duality in institutional trust among adults – being subdomain-specific yet unidimensionally ordered – little is known about how these patterns originate and develop. This study integrates evaluative and socialisation perspectives to investigate the development of institutional trust structures during adolescence. Using longitudinal data from the Dutch Adolescent Panel on Democratic Values (2018–2022), tracking adolescents from ages 12 to 16 (N = 1,092 individuals), we employ confirmatory factor analysis and Mokken scaling to assess how the subdomain-specific and hierarchical features of institutional trust evolve across time and cognitive resources (ie school track and political sophistication). Our results support an early macro-level socialisation account of trust development, showing that adolescents as young as 12 already distinguish between order and representative institutions and consistently rank them in ways that mirror adult trust structures. However, among adolescents with higher cognitive resources, these structures become more volatile in mid-to-late adolescence, suggesting the gradual onset of more individualised, evaluative trust judgements. Taken together, the findings show a dual process of institutional trust development, suggesting that early cultural imprinting provides a baseline blueprint of institutional trust, which may later be recalibrated by more sophisticated citizens through individual evaluation.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the ensuing increased concerns over energy prices, have created new controversies in the European political discourse over how to pursue an energy transition that can reconcile economic, environmental, and social objectives. In this context, this paper examines public opinion priorities and potential trade-offs across social groups regarding the need to combat climate change, ensure energy supply, and protect household disposable income. Using a conjoint survey experiment embedded in a cross-national survey conducted in December 2022, at the peak of the ‘energy crisis’, we first examine citizens’ preferences for alternative policy packages to respond to situations that vary among three conflicting dimensions: the climate and energy strategy pursued by national governments, different kinds of social compensation measures, and financing mechanisms. Second, we explore how these preferences vary across ideological leanings, socioeconomic groups, and vulnerability profiles related to environmental degradation and policies mitigating the effects of climate change. Our findings indicate that synergies exist between ecological and social goals: support for renewable energy investment increases when policies include social transfers and progressive financing mechanisms. However, partisan and socioeconomic divides make this multidimensional policy issue politically challenging. Policy solutions that combine renewables investments with social compensation are attractive to left-leaning individuals and to the pivotal group of centrist voters. However, low-income production workers who fear job loss tend to remain opposed to the energy transition, even when compensation is provided. This result highlights the trade-offs and political dilemmas that (left-leaning) parties face when navigating the energy transition.

Educational attainment is related to more political trust. In this study, we adopt a global perspective, arguing that this ‘education effect’ is conditional on the development of ‘schooled societies’. In such societies, schooling as a central institution installs educational attainment as a main source of social status, granting the higher educated a dominant position in the political field. Consequently, higher educated citizens have high levels of political trust, while the less educated are distrusting. In less schooled societies, however, the ‘education effect’ is more ambiguous, as the social status of the higher educated is less guaranteed and depends on their relationship to the state. Consequently, there may be a large gap in political trust between those who are publicly employed and those who are not. We, therefore, examined the relationship among educational attainment, a schooled society, sector of employment, and political trust. We combined the Schooled Society Index with data from the World Values Survey and European Values Study. Multilevel analyses across 84 countries (Nindividual = 102,102) revealed that the positive relationship between educational attainment and political trust was conditional on the development of ‘schooled’ society. Furthermore, in less strongly schooled societies, there was an important gap in political trust among the higher educated, depending on whether or not they were publicly employed. Such patterns cannot be explained by educational differences in political knowledge or cognitive sophistication. In contrast, our results imply that the ‘educational effect’ on political trust is strongly dependent on the social status of education-based groups.

Voting Advice Applications (VAAs) help voters make informed choices by aligning their policy preferences with party positions. This study examines whether VAA exposure enhances young citizens’ ideological knowledge – understanding political dimensions and party positions. A randomized experiment (n = 2308) in Belgium (Flanders) tested whether VAA exposure improved young voters’ ability to place a fictional party on the left-right axis. We replicate these effects in an additional observational study (n = 1221) tracking effects of natural VAA exposure during the campaign. We find that VAAs increase ideological knowledge, helping participants more accurately classify a fictional party as left- or right-wing. Exposure to a youth-targeted VAA has particularly strong effects. The impact is greater for politically less sophisticated individuals, suggesting an equalizing effect. These findings indicate that VAAs’ political learning benefits extend further than previously documented, contributing not only to policy-specific knowledge but also to a broader understanding of ideological structures.

This article examines what motivates elected representatives to engage with citizens in organised settings, specifically investigating the role of anticipatory representation – aligning policies with future voter preferences. Using representation theory, the study involves in-depth interviews with representatives in three Norwegian municipalities, focusing on their perception of public meetings as avenues for listening, convincing, and deliberating. The findings suggest that anticipatory representation minimally influences politicians’ attendance at these meetings. Instead, they view public meetings primarily as opportunities to listen to citizens rather than as platforms for persuasion or policy deliberation. Despite often disliking the confrontational aspects of these meetings, politicians attend to demonstrate presence and show interest in their constituents. Thus, the main motivation for their participation is the chance to exhibit responsiveness, rather than engaging in argumentative or deliberative exchanges. This research sheds light on the dynamics of politician–citizen interactions in democratic settings.

When democracy is eroded by democratically elected incumbents, it is up to others to defend democracy and sustain the democratic institutions. An emerging body of research looks at the roles, challenges, and tactics of these democratic defenders, yet there is no research that explores under what circumstances civil servants move from bystanders to democratic defenders. I argue that civil servants are prime candidates to defend democracy against incumbent-led autocratisation, which I conceptualise as ‘administrative democratic defence’. Based on in-depth, semi-structured elite interviews in the Netherlands, I argue that administrative democratic defence only occurs when three dilemmas are successfully navigated: civil servants need to perceive they have the capability to recognise autocratisation, they need to perceive they have access to legitimate instruments to halt it, and they need to be willing to use those instruments. In addition, I show how a resilient democracy requires continued awareness and action on its part – even in a highly democratic and liberal context.

Building popular support for democracy is especially necessary in countries ruled by authoritarian regimes. Can educational interventions promote democratic support in these countries and influence how citizens evaluate their country’s political regime? To answer these questions, we conducted two online experiments in Turkey comparing the effects of two pro-democratic educational interventions, a positive frame emphasizing gains from democratic institutions and a negative frame highlighting the losses under authoritarian regimes. Both treatment frames were successful at building democratic demand. However, only participants exposed to the pro-democracy messages with a positive frame took important additional cognitive steps, decreasing their evaluations of Turkey’s democratic supply and, therefore, becoming less likely to vote for the parties aligned with the autocratic regime. We offer a reference points theory to explain this divergence. Overall, our research makes significant contributions to the literature on democracy promotion and democratic support among ordinary citizens.

The far right is becoming increasingly established worldwide and is now in its ‘fourth wave’, characterised by its mainstreaming and normalisation. Although more and more political science research focuses on these processes, we argue that this literature lacks conceptual clarity about what these terms mean, which actors are involved, and what effects these processes have. This article has two aims. First, we describe how mainstreaming and normalisation have been conceptualised and analysed in the existing literature. Building on this, we then introduce a conceptual framework for future empirical research and discuss three research avenues: more precise operationalisations of the mainstream/normal and non-mainstream/abnormal, more refined theories about different political actors, and a broader analytical perspective beyond immigration issues and national-level dynamics.

Since the euro crisis, national stereotypes have often been present in the political and media discourse on European Union (EU) economic governance. Yet, despite the frequency of such stereotypes in political rhetoric and media coverage, little is known about their prevalence in public opinion or in connection with citizen preferences on EU redistribution. This article examines the relationship between national stereotypes held by EU citizens and their policy preferences for EU redistribution. We conduct an observational survey in four countries capturing regional differences in the EU: Germany (Western Europe), Italy (Southern Europe), Romania (Eastern Europe), and Sweden (Northern Europe). Our findings show that, on average, individuals who attribute more positive economic stereotypes (e.g., trustworthy, hardworking, efficient) to other EU nationalities tend to be more supportive of general solidarity in the EU, reducing inequality between member states, and the establishment of an EU-wide welfare state. Conversely, those who attribute more negative economic stereotypes (e.g., corrupt, greedy, lazy) to other EU nationalities are less likely to support such redistributive measures. We also find substantial heterogeneity between country samples, which may reflect differences in economic standing within the EU and historical experiences with stereotypes. Taken together, the findings reveal that national stereotypes are not only widespread in public opinion but also systematically linked to preferences for redistribution. The study contributes to the public opinion literature on transnational solidarity by showing how enduring national stereotypes can precede and inform narratives of deservingness.

For many years, political scientists have debated over voter competence in direct democracy. At the core of the discussion is whether this central institution enlightens citizens about political facts. However, scholars have primarily examined if direct democracy fosters general political knowledge even though referendums and ballot initiatives are policy-specific in nature, as citizens vote on particular political proposals. By utilising a range of unique panel survey data collected around four Danish European Union referendums, I show that voters’ knowledge of policy-specific information markedly increased during the campaigns. I also combine the survey data with an original media content analysis and find that the learning of issue-specific facts is more related to the opportunities provided by the media information environment than to individual ability or motivation. These results suggest that a broad group of voters acquire policy-specific facts that help them make informed choices when they are granted full control of political decision-making.

This paper examines the mobilizing capacity of the middle class in fostering civic activism under authoritarian rule. In particular, we examine whether the middle class has the potential to recruit other strata in civic activism. We use a boutique N=2017 survey conducted in Moscow, Russia, in December 2021, with an embedded conjoint experiment that identifies the reaction of respondents to an invitation from a hypothetical neighbor to take part in a civic action. We find that self-reported willingness to engage in civic activism is positively associated with the share of the middle class in the respondent’s district of residence. Furthermore, middle-class individuals are perceived as more knowledgeable and thus have higher mobilizing capacity; however, we find no evidence that individuals are more likely to be mobilized by someone from a similar social stratum. In districts with a low middle-class share, middle-class individuals exhibit higher willingness to engage in civic activism, but this difference disappears in high-middle-class districts. Finally, for civic activism, unlike the anti-regime protests, we find no evidence that dependence on the state reduces the self-reported willingness to engage in civic activism. A survey-based measure of past civic engagement augments findings from the conjoint experiment. Our findings contribute to research on authoritarian politics by refining our understanding of state–society relations, the middle class, civic activism, and local politics in autocracies, as well as to the general studies of impact of social context on civic activism, with implications beyond the Russian case.

Recent scholarship devotes considerable attention to how social identities influence vote choice. However, group sympathies or group affect constitute another, often overlooked subjective component of the relationship between social groups and vote choice. Based on reference group theory and drawing on ANES data as well as recent Danish and Austrian election surveys, we examine how voters’ sympathies with a range of groups are related to party choice across time and space. We find that group sympathies are related to vote choice in all three countries, even when controlling for objective group memberships and social identities. Across time, most relationships are stable or strengthening and comparable in strength to the relationship between group memberships and party choice. The relationship between group sympathies and vote choice is, furthermore, conditioned by perceived linkages between groups and parties. Hence, analyses of the role of social groups in voting also need to include group sympathies to grasp the full influence of social groups.

Peaceful transfers of power are a fundamental principle of democracy. Yet, in times of heightened affective polarisation, election losses may trigger strong negative emotional reactions in partisans, which in turn undermine support for fundamental democratic principles among partisans. We test this idea through two pre-registered survey experiments conducted after the 2022 and 2024 elections in the United States. We randomly assign partisans to receive either a placebo or an emotive reminder about the election that their party lost, containing others’ angry or worried reactions at the election outcome. Contrary to our pre-registered expectations, we do not find evidence that priming negative feelings about electoral loss affects support for political violence or democratic norms. Emotive reminders about salient political events can momentarily turn up the heat on politics, but are not enough to propel partisans to adopt extreme anti-democratic attitudes. By linking the study of emotions to democratic norms, this article contributes to our understanding of when negative emotions (fail to) radicalise partisans.

Multiple rounds of European Union (EU) enlargement and the rise of the populist radical right have affected the organisation of political competition in the European Parliament (EP). This study probes how the EU’s efforts to redress democratic backsliding in several EU member states crystallise deepening divides between European lawmakers. Our empirical analysis examines 17 roll-call votes on rule of law issues and well over 900 discursive statements from corresponding parliamentary debates held between 2009 and 2019. Our unique approach enables us to analyse discursive and voting patterns both separately and jointly to understand how they affect each other. We find that behaviour across these different arenas is generally consistent and aligns with an ideological divide that pits Eurosceptic Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) against representatives from pro-EU European party groups. Once we account for ideological orientations and strategic motivations, the often-claimed East–West divide on rule of law issues becomes much less salient, emerging primarily under specific conditions of ongoing democratic erosion and national incumbency in Central and Eastern Europe. Our findings speak to the literature on EU responses to democratic backsliding as well as to the changing dynamics of political competition in the EU more broadly.

Research shows that increased participation of women in parliaments benefits climate change outcomes. Yet, the actions taken by women parliamentarians to shape these outcomes have not been identified in the literature. I assert that a primary step by which women may generate impact is by championing environmentalism in their speeches before parliament. To test this, I analyse speeches from the UK House of Commons from 2010 to 2021, and find that women MPs both speak proportionately more about the environment than their male counterparts, and bring environmentalism into debates that are not explicitly coded as environmental. Finally, while Conservative women are outnumbered by men, they contribute significantly more to environmental speeches than their male counterparts. These results suggest that women are disproportionately responsible for embedding environmentalism into political discussions across Parliament and the Conservative Party, and prompt questions around the true cost of unequal representation for our climate.

Compensatory policies for the losers of trade are a key feature of the liberal economic order established after the Second World War. Legislators have a variety of policy options to choose. But do political elites and the public have the same attitudes toward compensatory policies? We expect an elite–public gap with the public relatively less supportive of spending policies and more supportive of tax cuts and trade restrictions than political elites. Moreover, we reason that ideology should matter more for elites than the public. Unique data from a survey with legislators in 19 European countries and public opinion surveys in three countries allow us to test this argument. We find that elites and the public indeed differ in their attitudes toward compensatory policies. However, these differences pale in comparison to variation in support for various compensatory policies. These findings shed light on the politics of compensation and on the political attitudes of elites and the public more broadly.

This is a study of how opposing cultural values influence support for minorities’ civil liberties. We build on a rich body of work, which establishes that culturally liberal Europeans are more likely to value diversity and favor minority rights than are cultural conservatives. Our contribution is to bring attention to how a second dimension of value conflict upends this established pattern. If a religious minority, in this case Muslims, wants to use their religious freedom to call on Muslims to adhere to conservative Islamic values – to preach them – support for their civil liberties plunges. We report substantively large and remarkably consistent results from seven classical tolerance experiments conducted in three European countries. In each trial, we observe the tendency of non-Muslims to deny Muslims their right to freedom of religion. We consistently observe that culturally liberal citizens join cultural conservatives in turning against Muslims’ right to hold a public rally when Muslims intend to exercise their right to freedom of expression to preach (the speech-act dimension) culturally conservative ideas in Islam (the substantive dimension). Preaching is a performative utterance, an instance of when saying something is doing something. What is being done, in addition to what is being said, is to call for compliance. This study finds that conflicts with religiously grounded values in contemporary European liberal democracies often have an additional order of intensity, because stating religious beliefs in the form of performative utterances is an integral part of religious practice.