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Democratic Preferences and the COVID-19 pandemic

Hassing Nielsen, Julie LU and Hedefalk, Finn LU orcid (2023)
Abstract
Did the political COVID-19 pandemic impact levels of populism? And did a potential effect travel across different national pandemic strategies? Populism is characterized by a growing antagonistic elite-population gap, which might be further triggered by top-down pandemic legislation. Using large-n panel survey data from Denmark and Sweden, being two similar Scandinavian universal welfare states that nevertheless adapted two very dissimilar pandemic strategies, we explore how populism evolved during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, relying on national census and geocoded telecom data, we explore if the evolution of populism is related to civil disobedience to pandemic regulations. We show that populism significantly... (More)
Did the political COVID-19 pandemic impact levels of populism? And did a potential effect travel across different national pandemic strategies? Populism is characterized by a growing antagonistic elite-population gap, which might be further triggered by top-down pandemic legislation. Using large-n panel survey data from Denmark and Sweden, being two similar Scandinavian universal welfare states that nevertheless adapted two very dissimilar pandemic strategies, we explore how populism evolved during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, relying on national census and geocoded telecom data, we explore if the evolution of populism is related to civil disobedience to pandemic regulations. We show that populism significantly rose in both countries between March-June 2020. Yet, this evolution remains untied to ideology, inter-regional geography, and the spread of contamination. The findings highlight severe democratic consequences of pandemic legislation across both open and voluntary pandemic strategies as well as more closed lockdowns. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
and
organization
publishing date
type
Working paper/Preprint
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Covid-19, populism, survey data, Geographical information system, comparative politics
publisher
SocArXiv
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
e6c065dd-e178-48e8-bbda-0ac896699e29
alternative location
https://osf.io/z6pvm
date added to LUP
2023-10-19 11:35:12
date last changed
2023-10-19 17:17:42
@misc{e6c065dd-e178-48e8-bbda-0ac896699e29,
  abstract     = {{Did the political COVID-19 pandemic impact levels of populism? And did a potential effect travel across different national pandemic strategies? Populism is characterized by a growing antagonistic elite-population gap, which might be further triggered by top-down pandemic legislation. Using large-n panel survey data from Denmark and Sweden, being two similar Scandinavian universal welfare states that nevertheless adapted two very dissimilar pandemic strategies, we explore how populism evolved during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, relying on national census and geocoded telecom data, we explore if the evolution of populism is related to civil disobedience to pandemic regulations. We show that populism significantly rose in both countries between March-June 2020. Yet, this evolution remains untied to ideology, inter-regional geography, and the spread of contamination. The findings highlight severe democratic consequences of pandemic legislation across both open and voluntary pandemic strategies as well as more closed lockdowns.}},
  author       = {{Hassing Nielsen, Julie and Hedefalk, Finn}},
  keywords     = {{Covid-19; populism; survey data; Geographical information system; comparative politics}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{10}},
  note         = {{Preprint}},
  publisher    = {{SocArXiv}},
  title        = {{Democratic Preferences and the COVID-19 pandemic}},
  url          = {{https://osf.io/z6pvm}},
  year         = {{2023}},
}