Stuck Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Exit, Voice, and Loyalty Within a Populist Party Organization

In recent years, there has been a growing scholarly interest in populist parties and the issues that serve as the raison d’être for their political platforms. What was once thought to be a temporary anomaly within politics has become an integral element in most party systems. While the literature on populist parties has largely been preoccupied with charismatic leaders, whether in the form of the provoking anti-hero or the captivating intellectual, less has been written about the organization of these parties once they have transcended to political influence. By adapting the theoretical concepts of exit, voice, and loyalty to one of the oldest anti-political establishment parties in Europe, the Danish People’s Party, this paper seeks to bridge the literature on political parties and organizational studies and thereby provide a new theoretical lens on political party developments. Using process tracing as our methodological framework, we seek to investigate the behavioral patterns of party members vis-à-vis the leadership during times of turbulence and crisis. The emergence of the Danish People’s Party came largely as a result of the inability of then-members of the Danish Progress Party to voice criticism of the political direction taken by the party leadership. Paradoxically, this pattern has replicated itself most visibly in the exodus of elected members in the wake of recent leadership feuds within the Danish People’s Party. By using expert interviews and document analysis, our findings show that while there is an infrastructure for voicing dissatisfaction at the grass-roots and municipal levels, less can be said for those officials elected in national politics and its leadership. Only once a crisis has erupted within the political party, as a consequence of decreasing voter support or political scandals, will the leadership be confronted with the dissatisfaction of its members. The lack of a setting that allows members to voice concern to the leadership presents a continuing organizational challenge for the populist party as it seeks to move from the political periphery towards gaining political influence.