Italy Focused Research Fellow Mattia Zulianello Writes a Feature for Domani
PiAP’s Italy focused Research Fellow Dr. Mattia Zulianello has had a feature article published in Domani a recently created broadsheet style newspaper focused on longform journalism and expert analysis.
In the piece entitled This is Why the pandemics Have Not Killed Populism, the key points he makes based upon his research are:
Most European populist parties had a negative trend in their voting intentions in the first phase of the pandemic (until the end June). However, despite some notable exceptions, the decline in polls has been rather limited, and is far from being a debacle. More generally, various parties actually gained votes by the summer.
Governing parties in Europe, both populist and non-populist, tended to benefit from the rally-round-the-flag effect. In particular, right-wing populists in government in Europe have seen substantial growth in voting intentions when adopting the most stringent measures to contain the spread of the virus.