Populism and the Skill-Content of Globalization: Evidence from the Last 60 Years

126 Pages Posted: 18 Nov 2022

See all articles by Frédéric Docquier

Frédéric Docquier

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER); Université catholique de Louvain; Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER); CREAM, Centre for Research on Environmental Appraisal & Management, UK; IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Lucas Guichard

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)

Stefano Iandolo

University of Salerno

Hillel Rapoport

Paris School of Economics (PSE)

Riccardo Turati

Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona

Gonzague Vannoorenberghe

Catholic University of Louvain (UCL)

Date Written: 2022

Abstract

We analyze the long-run evolution of populism and explore the role of globalization in shaping such evolution. We use an imbalanced panel of 628 national elections in 55 countries over 60 years. A first novelty is our reliance on both standard (e.g., the ”volume margin”, or vote share of populist parties) and new (e.g., the ”mean margin”, a continuous vote-weighted average of populism scores of all parties) measures of the extent of populism. We show that levels of populism in the world have strongly fluctuated since the 1960s, peaking after each major economic crisis and reaching an all-time high – especially for right-wing populism in Europe – after the great recession of 2007-10. The second novelty is that when we investigate the ”global” determinants of populism, we look at trade and immigration jointly and consider their size as well as their skill-structure. Using OLS, PPML and IV regressions, our results consistently suggest that populism responds to globalization shocks in a way which is closely linked to the skill structure of these shocks. Imports of low-skill labor intensive goods increase both total and right-wing populism at the volume and mean margins, and more so in times of de-industrialization and of internet expansion. Low-skill immigration, on the other hand, tends to induce a transfer of votes from left-wing to right-wing populist parties, apparently without affecting the total. Finally, imports of high-skill labor intensive goods, as well as high-skill immigration, tend to reduce the volume of populism.

Keywords: elections, populism, immigration, trade

JEL Classification: D720, F220, F520, J610

Suggested Citation

Docquier, Frédéric and Docquier, Frédéric and Guichard, Lucas and Iandolo, Stefano and Rapoport, Hillel and Turati, Riccardo and Vannoorenberghe, Gonzague, Populism and the Skill-Content of Globalization: Evidence from the Last 60 Years (2022). CESifo Working Paper No. 10068, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4273442 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4273442

Frédéric Docquier (Contact Author)

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) ( email )

11, Porte des Sciences
Campus Belval – Maison des Sciences Humaines
Esch-sur-Alzette, L-4366
Luxembourg

Université catholique de Louvain ( email )

IRES
Place Montesquieu 3
Louvain-la-Neuve, 1348
Belgium

HOME PAGE: http://https://perso.uclouvain.be/frederic.docquier/

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) ( email )

11, Porte des Sciences
Campus Belval – Maison des Sciences Humaines
Esch-sur-Alzette, L-4366
Luxembourg

CREAM, Centre for Research on Environmental Appraisal & Management, UK

University of Newcastle
NE1 7RU Newcastle Upon Tyne
United States

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Lucas Guichard

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) ( email )

11, Porte des Sciences
Campus Belval – Maison des Sciences Humaines
Esch-sur-Alzette, L-4366
Luxembourg

Stefano Iandolo

University of Salerno ( email )

Via Giovanni Paolo II, 132
Fisciano, Salerno 84084
Italy

Hillel Rapoport

Paris School of Economics (PSE) ( email )

48 Boulevard Jourdan
Paris, 75014 75014
France

Riccardo Turati

Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona ( email )

Gonzague Vannoorenberghe

Catholic University of Louvain (UCL) ( email )

Place Montesquieu, 3
Louvain-la-Neuve, 1348
Belgium

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