The role of civil society in political cleavage formation under the populist rule: The Hungarian, Polish, and Israeli case

This study aims to identify the role of civil society in the transformation of political cleavages in de-democratizing regimes. A striking development in the last 15 years of politics is the rise of populist actors to power in democratic countries. This tendency goes hand in hand with de-democratization since populists in power often attempt to empty democratic institutions, occupy the media and cut independent social and political actors from their resources. However, to maintain and legitimise their rule, they seek strong popular support. The primary tool to gain and sustain this support is to deepen existing, and create new political cleavages to increase political polarization and nurture exclusive, antagonistic political identities. In this paper, I will show, how populist governments use the discourse of civil society to enhance political polarization and, how networks of civil society organizations play an important role in the social embeddedness of these cleavages. The research shows, that while the discourse of civil society is one of the tools for forging exclusive political identities, pro-government and right-wing organizations and movements provide networks to build the social base of these identities effectively. I will also examine whether the responses of independent, or left-liberal civil society organizations to populist government’s policies (often referred to as shrinking space, or contested space for civil society) can counterbalance polarization processes, or further enhance them. The research applies a case study methodology, relying on three country cases, Hungary, Poland and Israel. The time frame of the analysis is between 2010 and 2020 (2015-202 in the case of Poland respectively). In each cases, I analyse the policies and main political discourse towards civil society, and the responses of civil society organizations, with a diverse ideological background and a difference in closeness to the governments, through frame analysis and organizational interviews.