Left Behind or Let Down? The Effect of Experiencing Unreliability on Populist Voting

Research has found that attitudes towards far-reaching policies, such as being against immigration, are associated with voting for populist radical right parties. Although it has been overlooked for a long time, recent research has begun to pay more attention to what citizens worry about with regard to their direct and local surroundings. In this realm, for example, effects of (perceived) deprivation in combination with a rural-urban divide on populist voting have been found. We argue that while individual-level discontent might stem from specific conditions of rural areas, the factor of unreliability has been overlooked as an important factor to fuel discontent and increase the probability to vote for populist parties. It is commonly argued that the feeling of being left behind makes it more likely for citizens to vote for populist parties. In addition, we propose to look at the discrepancy between expectations and being let down. Citizens living in urban areas expect state infrastructure, such as public transport, provision of medical care and availability of daycare slots and schools. However, they may experience frequent cancellations of trains and buses, drug shortages, poor access to medical care, and unavailability of daycare and schools slots. Belying expectations and being let down might even outweigh the feeling of being left behind and thus mobilize citizens to vote for the populist radical right, who promises a stable world view and present themselves as an antipole to uncertainty. We (1) theoretically and empirically establish the distinct feeling of being let down and (2) analyze how it affects populist voting, drawing on original experimental data from Austria and Germany. With this paper, we contribute to the literature on explaining populist voting behavior drawing on individual-level data. We integrate novel arguments that we consider of importance to further elucidate the role of individual-level attitudes in the rise of populism in European countries. In addition, we address the understudied rural-urban divide and how it is associated with the success of populism.