The Electoral Ramifications of Including and Excluding Populist Parties in/from Government

Throughout Europe, populist parties –left-wing and especially right-wing (from now: LWPP and RWPP)– have persistently obtained good election results, which has culminated in these parties entering governments as coalition partners (e.g., in Austria, Italy, Spain, Norway) or as formal supporters of a minority government (e.g., Denmark, the Netherlands) (Albertazzi & McDonnell, 2010; Askim et al., 2021; Krause & Wagner, 2021). This has opened up a new research agenda on studies exploring the effects of incumbency records on electoral behavior (Akkerman & De Lange, 2012), effects of populist ruling on policies (Akkerman, 2012; Chueri, 2020; Paxton, 2021), ramifications for citizens’ attitudes, such as satisfaction with democracy (Harteveld et al., 2021; Muis et al., 2021) and consequences for the normalization and mainstreaming of populist parties (Askim et al., 2021; Mazzolini & Borriello, 2021). This study aims to add to this body of literature by systematically exploring how inclusion and exclusion of populist parties in/from government affects electoral support (i.e., the vote for the populist and mainstream parties, turnout and blank/invalid votes). More specifically, the key objective is to map the aggregate-level effects of including and excluding LWPPs and RWPPs in government (and minority governments supported by LWPPs and RWPPs), while studying this in relationship to country-level characteristics. I draw on evidence from a uniquely compiled comparative aggregate-level dataset covering governments in sixteen European countries for a 30-year period (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom) to shed light on these questions (1990-2021). These cases reflect variation by including various elections, covering countries where populist parties have either never ruled before, have formally supported a minority government or have joined a government as a coalition partner. This dataset combines data from official elections with data on government composition, election indices (vote shares, seats, turnout), and country-level variables (electoral system, fragmentation, prior incumbency, portfolios, type of populist party). This allows to study effects of including or excluding populist parties on patterns in electoral support. Populist parties have increasingly joined governments or supported a minority government. Preliminary findings indicate that this overall –with some exceptions— is associated with a net increase in support for populist parties (mainly for LWPPs) and a drop in electoral support for mainstream parties. Still, in countries with high vote shares for populist parties and where they are excluded from the government, non-inclusion is highly associated with significant loss in electoral support for mainstream parties that are ideologically close to the populist party as well. Finally, it seems that exclusion of populist parties that are electorally strong is associated with a drop in turnout at the next elections. We do see, however, that a set of country-level variables moderate this relationship. Hence, results point to a paradox as both including and excluding populist parties in/from government seems to harm mainstream parties’ electoral support, while populist parties electoral support bases remain quite stable.