East Versus West on the European Populism Scale

Abstract

We study a sample of individuals in 20 European countries that includes eight East European countries in order to identify whether these eight countries differ from the Western countries in the popularity of right-wing populist parties once we have controlled for personal attributes. The results show variation among the East European countries so that they are not distinct from Western Europe. In particular, in Hungary and Poland populist right-wing parties enjoy greater support once account is taken of the variables above. Moreover, we find that a right-wing identity, a negative view of immigrants, not being satisfied with democracy, being negative on homosexuality, and mistrust in both the national and the European parliament seem to be the factors heavily correlated with voting for a right-wing populist party in Europe. Also, men are more likely to vote for a right-wing populist party as are the old and the less educated. Having experienced unemployed also increased the probability of voting for these parties.

Keywords: populist right-wing parties, survey evidence

JEL Classification: P160, Z180