Ideology, Direct Democracy, and Populism: Preferences and Participation of Left-wing and Right-wing Populist Citizens

Several studies have investigated whether direct-democratic instruments match the procedural preferences of populist citizens (e.g. Jacobs et al. 2018; Mohrenberg et al. 2021; Zaslove et al. 2021; Trüdinger/Bächtiger 2022), an issue that features prominently both in the academic and public debate on dissatisfaction with representative democracy. It is an under-researched question, however, whether citizens with populist attitudes and/or populist vote intentions would actually participate in direct-democratic procedures when respective instruments are available in political practice. A discrepancy between attitudinal support and effective participation in direct-democratic voting would raise doubts whether populists’ satisfaction with democracy could be enhanced in the long run and a ‘preference’ and ‘representation gap’ be easily closed by introducing more direct-democratic instruments. Moreover, a discrepancy between attitudes and action might also indicate that support for direct democracy merely reflects opposition to the existing institutions of the representative system rather than a real demand for more participatory forms of democratic governance. Our paper addresses this question with the help of an online survey of 2,000 respondents in Germany. It adds two important aspects to current research. First, taking into account that populist beliefs can occur in combination with different core ideologies, we examine whether the effects of right-wing and left-wing populism are different. For instance, left-wing populism is associated with a more inclusionary conception of the ‘people’ than right-wing populism (Caiani and Graziano 2019). Left-wing populists might therefore be more open to subscribe to a different vision and practice of direct democracy. To test these expectations, we consider a wide range of orientations and issue positions (e.g. attitudes towards immigration, towards social policies) associated with left-wing and right-wing ‘host ideologies’. Second, we examine whether direct-democratic preferences and participation are actually affected by populist orientations or are rather driven by psychological motives related to apathy, alienation, and a lack of civic duty.