Vulnerability to Populism in the Proximity of War: Eastern Europe Compared

• In Event: War in Ukraine and Its Implications

Abstract

Worldwide, Russia’s war against Ukraine has taken public opinion aback. In Europe, most concerns came from states bordering Ukraine, their citizens fearing the conflict might spill over onto their countries’ territories. Unsurprisingly, the war generated a swirl of political communication effects, creating a favourable context for new populist narratives in Eastern Europe. In Hungary, it provided a propitious occasion for Viktor Orban to signal unabashed admiration for Putin’s illiberal values, in opposition to EU stances. In Poland, the populist discourse rests on anti-Ukrainian tropes, with claims that Ukrainians receive too much support, at the expense of ordinary Poles. In Romania, the war sparked public approval for a radical populist party, swiftly gaining ground in opinion polls.
Studies linked public adherence to populist narratives to political anxiety, anti-elite sentiment, or feelings of powerlessness. However, given the ongoing nature of the war in Ukraine, there is little scientific evidence related to which of the existing populist narratives have more traction, especially in countries neighbouring the conflict – considering the circumstance they bear the brunt of hybrid warfare. As such, the current paper seeks to answer the following research questions:
RQ1: What are the main populist narratives disseminated in Romania, Poland, and Hungary since the start of the war in Ukraine?
RQ2: Which of the populist narratives disseminated in Romania, Poland, and Hungary weight more in shaping the perceptions of citizens in times of neighbouring war?
To answer RQ1, the current paper employs critical discourse analysis (CDA) on a variety of social media sources that have disseminated the populist discourse in Poland, Romania, and Hungary since the start of the war in neighbouring Ukraine. The research adheres to the Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA) which has been extensively used in the study of populism (Sengul, 2019). Based on the definition of populism as a political communication strategy that presents politics to be a struggle between the many but powerless People against the few but powerful elites (Hawkins & Kaltwasser, 2017; Stoica, 2021), the current research identifies narratives that frame both ‘elites’ and ‘the People’ in the populist discourse across the three countries since February 24th, 2022 (the start of the war in Ukraine). We also highlight similarities and differences between the populist discourse in the three countries, as part of a comparative approach.
To answer RQ2, we make use of an original set of public opinion data (N = 8,743) collected through a political compass disseminated via social media in Romania, Hungary, and Poland since the start of the war. Using the data, we test which of the narratives identified for RQ1 trigger most support for populist narratives in these three countries. The variables were drawn from the narratives identified for RQ1, and include attitudes towards the European Union, fears related to a ‘spill-over effect’ of the war, attitudes towards Ukrainian refugees, the logic of a ‘zero-sum’ war, simple-mindedness, and need for protection. We therefore seek to bring a significant contribution to the concept of ‘vulnerability to populism’ (Stoica, 2023), by understanding it in the context of the war. We consider people who manifest a propensity to accept and multiply such narratives to be vulnerable to populism. By comparing the data, we also develop a nuanced understanding of what drives people towards the new narratives of populism in these three countries in the vicinity of the war. We also tap into the socio-demographic profile of the respondents, their political preferences, ideological and economic perspectives, as well as worldviews.
Romania, Poland, and Hungary are relevant case studies for a comparative approach not only for their geographical proximity to the war but also given the many differences in terms of political discourse and party competition, as well as the different attitudes related to the European Union and NATO. As such, the paper identifies which of the populist narratives align more with public perceptions in each of the three countries. We then compare the results, bringing forth a nuanced image of political communication in times of crisis. Moreover, the ambition that underpins the entire approach of the paper is that of bringing a contribution to identifying the profile of people with a high receptivity to populism during unprecedented times for Europe and the world since World War II.

Authors

• Andreea Voina, Babes-Bolyai University

• Mihnea Simion Stoica, Babeș-Bolyai University

• Michał Rauszer, University of Warsaw

• Ioan Hosu, Babes-Bolyai University