Democracy and Populism: Testing a Contentious Relationship

33 Pages Posted: 18 Oct 2019

See all articles by Saskia P. Ruth-Lovell

Saskia P. Ruth-Lovell

GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies

Anna Lührmann

University of Gothenburg - Department of Political Science

Sandra Grahn

University of Gothenburg

Date Written: 2019

Abstract

The phenomenon of populism and its relationship with modern democracy has gained considerable attention in recent years. This paper aims at advancing our understanding of how populism affects different models of democracy and tests the proposed arguments empirically. Building on the large scholarly literature on populism and democracy, we take stock of existing arguments and theorize which democratic models may be affected by populism in a positive or a negative way. Moreover, we move beyond the normative debate and analyse the effect of populism in power on different models of democracy empirically. We do so by merging data on populist governments in Europe and Latin America from the 1995 until today with the Varieties of Democracy data set, which enables us to capture the relationship between populism and different democratic models in these regions.

Suggested Citation

Ruth-Lovell, Saskia P. and Lührmann, Anna and Grahn, Sandra, Democracy and Populism: Testing a Contentious Relationship (2019). V-Dem Working Paper 2019:91, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3471132 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3471132

Saskia P. Ruth-Lovell (Contact Author)

GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies

Jungfernstieg 21
Hamburg, 20354
Germany

Anna Lührmann

University of Gothenburg - Department of Political Science ( email )

Box 711
Göteborg, S-405 30
Sweden

Sandra Grahn

University of Gothenburg ( email )

Gothenburg
Sweden

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
887
Abstract Views
2,315
Rank
49,648
PlumX Metrics