Support populist sentiment Europe According to a major YouGov survey, there has been a sharp decline in the past three years, and the number of people agreeing with key statements aimed at measuring it has decreased significantly.
The YouGov-Cambridge Globalism Project’s annual populism tracker was produced with the Guardian and found that populist beliefs in 10 European countries generally continued to decline, prompting its author to suggest that some broader electoral appeal may have reached its peak.
Political scientists said that the latest results show “significant reduction in support for populism,” but added that the results may mask a higher degree of radicalization among populist voters, and the pandemic may be a factor.
exist FranceAccording to the survey, the percentage of adults who believe that “the will of the people should be the highest principle of this country’s politics” has fallen from 66% in 2019 to 62% in 2020 and 55% in 2021.
Other EU countries that have shown the same sharp decline include Germany (66%, 63%, 61%), Denmark (61%, 56%, 50%), Spain (75%, 68%, 65%), Italy (72%, 71%, 64%) and Poland (80% %, 71%, 65%), and the UK outside the EU (66%, 60%, 56%).
PopulismDefining politics as a struggle between ordinary people and corrupt elites, it has quickly grown into a political force, and has been supported by populist parties in European national elections. Soaring from 7% to more than 25% Within 20 years.
Primarily far-right populist leaders – Matteo Salvini in Italy, Marina Le Pen in France, Victor Orban in Hungary or Jimmy Oxon in Sweden – have flourished Development, populist parties are or have served in the governments of several EU countries.
Support for the view that “my country is divided into ordinary people and corrupt elites who exploit them” has fallen from 61% to 49% in France, in Germany (54%-46%), Sweden (42%-36%), Denmark (29%-15), Spain (70%-65%), Italy (65%-54%), Poland (73%-63%) and the United Kingdom (58% to 54%).
Regarding the statement of “intentionally concealing a lot of important information from the public out of self-interest,” the consent rate within three years is also low, dropping by 6 to 17 percentage points in the same country/region-although it is still high in some countries, like Spain (79%).
Matisse RuduinPolitical sociologists and populist experts at the University of Amsterdam said that this survey of more than 24,000 voters in 22 different countries showed that support for populist ideas has “significantly declined” in the past three years.
But while it shows that voters, on average, seem to be becoming more moderate and less receptive to populist ideas, “for example, a small group of people who vote for a populist radical right party may become more radical – more and more Not less populists”.
Rooduijn also said that some of these statements may touch on anti-experts and anti-elite sentiments that have been suppressed by the coronavirus pandemic. Although it promotes minority groups such as anti-vaccineists to become more extreme, it tends to increase trust in the scientific field. To some extent, in the government field. “This is already changing,” he said.
Although there are concerns about the growing popularity of conspiracy theories during the Covid-19 pandemic, several countries in the study also show that the number of people who support conspiracy theories in general has continued to decline.
Support the belief that “the power of a few special interest groups hinders our country’s progress”. For example, France has fallen from 72% to 58%, Germany has also fallen by 5 percentage points, Sweden has fallen by 9 points, Denmark has fallen by 15 percentage points, and 10 In Spain, 12 are in Italy and 11 are in Poland And the UK.
Although several non-EU countries, including Brazil and Mexico, have shown similar patterns, other countries, including India, Thailand, and especially the United States-have been compared with any of the survey statements in the annual survey reports of the past three years. The overall degree of agreement has hardly changed. Polls-no.
The authors of the survey conducted in August and September stated that this may mean that “some forms of anti-establishment dissatisfaction” is deeply entrenched in these countries.
But they pointed out that, in fact, between 2019 and 2021, there was no significant trend showing that populist sentiment has shifted to another path, “perhaps showing that the honor of populist faith has reached its peak around the world,” they pointed out.
The investigation once again found that Denmark stands out as a bastion of anti-populist sentiment, and its agreement with most statements is surprisingly low compared with other countries.
For example, only 8% of Danish respondents agree with the statement that “you can judge a person politically is good or bad”, 18% believe that special interests hinder progress, and 15% believe that their country is divided into ordinary people And corrupt elites.
The survey also revealed that when it comes to the actual consequences of populist political methods—such as the Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom—many Europeans tend to take a more neutral view.
When asked about the impact of Brexit on the economic situation and unification of the European Union, most of the respondents from the 10 European countries (including the United Kingdom) surveyed said that no matter which method, there is no difference in general.
However, it is worth noting that they are more inclined to adopt a negative view than a positive one. For example, only 6% of Germans believe that Brexit makes the rest of the EU members more united, while one in five (20%) believes it is the opposite.
Similarly, 37% of people in Spain believe that Brexit has harmed the EU economically, while only 8% believe that it makes the EU better.
The survey was conducted between August 4 and September 21. The sample came from more than 1,000 people from 10 European countries: Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Hungary, Poland, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom and 17 other countries, including Australia, the United States, Brazil, Mexico, Turkey, Russia, China, Japan and South Africa.
