Friendly foes or enemies within? Assessing the (in)stability of governments with populists in Europe

As the electoral success of populist parties and their establishment in the party systems increases, so does the number of governments including populists. Single-party governments are the exception. In most cases, mainstream parties invite populists as minor partners despite their anti-elitist platform, such as in Austria, Finland or the Netherlands. In other constellations, populists represent the larger coalition partner (Poland). Still other governments, such as in Greece or Italy, were formed exclusively by populist parties. Many cases indicate that governing with populists is less stable. In the Netherlands, Austria and Italy ended prematurely - sometimes due to scandals (Austria), often due to disagreement over policy (Italy). However, research is still lacking a systematic assessment about the likelihood and the causes of populist governments collapsing. This paper shall provide an empirical analysis of this problem, based on European governments since 1990.