Democratic Efficacy and the Varieties of Populism in Europe – DEMOS

Location

Total Budget

Coordinator

Financed by

Project Type

Time Frame

EU

3.037.781,25 €

HUNGARIAN ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES RESEARCH CENTER FOR SOCIAL SCIENCES

European Comission

HORIZON 2020

Project Goals and Outcomes

DEMOS is built on the assumption that populism is symptomatic of a disconnect between how democratic polities operate and how citizens perceive their own aspirations, needs and identities within the political system. As such, DEMOS explores the practical value of ’democratic efficacy’ as the condition of political engagement needed to address the challenge of populism. The concept combines attitudinal features (political efficacy), political skills, knowledge, and democratic opportunity structures. In order to better understand populism DEMOS addresses its hitherto under-researched aspects at micro-, meso-, and macro-levels: its socio-psychological roots, social actors’ responses to the populist challenge, and populism’s effects on governance. DEMOS focuses not only on the polity, but equally on citizens’ perspectives: how they are affected by, and how they react to, populism. Politically underrepresented groups and those targeted by populist politics are a particular focus, e.g. youth, women, and migrants. As populism has varying socially embedded manifestations, DEMOS aims at contextualising it through comparative analysis on the variety of populisms across Europe, including their historical, cultural, and socioeconomic roots, manifestations, and impacts. DEMOS develops indicators and predictors of populism and elaborates scenarios on the interactions of populism with social actors and institutions both at the national and the EU levels. Unifying 15 partners from 10 disciplines, DEMOS combines in-depth research on populism and democratic efficacy with action research and pilot projects in order to develop lasting tools and timely policy recommendations; project methods include experiments, deliberative polling, text mining, surveys, and legal analysis. DEMOS places strong emphasis on communication and productive interactions with a variety of stakeholders throughout the project, including policymakers, journalists, students, and the general public.

Activities

D2.1. Conceptualizing the varieties of populism.

D2.2. Triggers of populism.

D3.1. Conceptualizing democratic efficacy.

D3.2. Democratic efficacy: the state of the art.

D4.1. Measuring populism.

D4.2. Populist attitudes and emotions.

D4.3. The motives behind the support for populism.

D4.4. Cognitive processes and populist arguments.

D5.1. Populism and policymaking: local, national and international levels.

D6.1. The legal impacts of populism.

D6.2. Populism and democracy.

D7.1. Reactions to populism: citizens.

D7.2. Reactions to populism: institutions.

D 8.1. Delibertion and populism.

D 8.2. Citizens on countering populism.

D 8.3. Addressing the populist challenge: tools.
D9.1. Policy recommendations.

Thematic Areas

Human rights and Democracy 

Partners

1. Hungarian Academy of Social Sciences, Research Center for Social Sciences;

2. University of Hamburg;

3. Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan;

4. Kaunas University of Technology;

5. Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy;

6. School of Communication and Media, no;

7. University of Business Engineering and Management;

8. Charles University in Prague;

9. European Citizen Action Service;

10. University of Turin;

11. Glasgow Caledonian University;

12. University of Amsterdam;

13. University of Copenhagen;

14. University of Barcelona;
University of Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne.

Publications