A Matter of Reciprocity: Does Increasing Recognition for ‘Those Who Work’ Decrease Support for Blaming Welfare Recipients?

This study investigates whether enhancing recognition for a specific social group reduces their support for blaming outgroups. We focus on the scapegoating of welfare recipients - a tactic commonly employed by populist radical right-wing parties (PRRPs) in Europe to mobilize discontented workers. Using a large survey experiment conducted in France, Germany, and the UK (N = 6,000), we explore how a discourse emphasizing worth and recognition for "those who work" affects perceptions of the deservingness of unemployed and immigrant welfare beneficiaries, as well as other political attitudes. PRRPs often exploit norms of reciprocity within European welfare states, portraying outgroups like the unemployed and immigrants as undeserving. This rhetoric resonates strongly among workers with stable but low-prestige jobs, low wages, or poor working conditions, who feel underappreciated in the socio-economic hierarchy. Instead of addressing work-related issues, PRRPs channel these frustrations into support for punitive policies targeting perceived non-contributors. We test whether promoting positive in-group identities for workers -framing them as deserving of respect and improved material conditions- can counteract outgroup blame. Our hypotheses suggest that increasing recognition for workers will reduce support for scapegoating and populist attitudes while boosting satisfaction with democracy and self-perceived social status. The experimental design features three treatments: (1) a positive in-group message advocating better wages and working conditions, (2) a negative in-group message emphasizing productivity over worker welfare, and (3) a neutral placebo. Participants' attitudes toward social policies, perceptions of group deservingness, and political preferences are measured post-treatment. Additionally, we examine variations across subgroups with low wages, poor working conditions, and mid- to low-skilled occupations. France, Germany, and the UK were selected as comparative cases due to their differing welfare systems and levels of PRRP influence. France and Germany's generous welfare state and strong worker protections contrast with the UK's minimal assistance model, offering a robust test of the intervention across institutional contexts. This research contributes novel insights to debates on social recognition and populism by providing the first causal evidence on whether recognition-based strategies mitigate outgroup blame and strengthen democratic values. It also introduces the first systematic analysis of public support for work-related social policies, addressing a significant gap in the literature on socio-economic preferences and their electoral impacts.