The Growth of Populism in the Political Mainstream

This book examines the populist communication of mainstream parties in Germany, Austria, Italy, and Spain. For a long time, populist and radical right parties have been the main subject of investigation in academic research. Yet, how mainstream parties react to the rise of such actors is less known. Scholars assume a populist Zeitgeist, a populist contagion claiming that the political mainstream actively engages in populist and nativist discourses.
The author tests this widespread assumption analyzing whether center-left and center-right mainstream parties adopt populist messages, as well as content related to the leftist and right-wing host ideologies of populist actors. Therefore, this book is a must-read for scholars, students, and researchers of political science and electoral studies, as well as policy-makers and practitioners interested in a better understanding of populism and populist communication.

Provides a new interpretation regarding the dangers of populist and nativist discourses Avoids complex regression analysis and is easy to understand for the reader due to its largely qualitative approach Offers new findings on a highly relevant topic widely discussed in science and the public discourse

Autorentext

Jakob Schwörer is a research fellow at the Institute for Political Science at the Leuphana University Lüneburg (Germany) and teaches the political system of Germany, party politics and populism. His research focuses on political parties, populist and nativist communication as well as religiously framed discourses of political actors in a comparative perspective.In 2016, his book "Populismi. Il Movimento 5 Stelle e la Alternativa per la Germania" was nominated for the National Award of the Italian Book Association (AIL) in the category Political and Social Sciences.

Inhalt
Chapter 1: Introduction: Populistisation of mainstream parties?.- Chapter 2: Theoretical-conceptual framework.- Chapter 3: Study design and analytical approach.- Chapter 4:Contamination of mainstream parties' messages? shifting degrees of communicative content.- Chapter 5: From degrees to content: The meaning of communicative content and emerging discourses.- Chapter 6: Conclusion.