Steven M. Van Hauwaert’s research while affiliated with Lille Catholic University and other places

Since the 1980s, the study of opinions towards immigration has grown exponentially throughout European scholarship. Most existing studies, however, are limited in their scope and do not specifically refer to an aggregate phenomenon, but rather an individual one. This study seeks to establish empirically whether aggregate public immigration preferences across 13 European democracies relate systematically to national socio-political indicators or other underlying societal mechanics. Particularly, we analyze four mechanisms more in-depth, namely the predictive values of economic deprivation, immigration policy, immigration flows and the political environment. To do so we rely on country-level level data and update a unique dataset of immigration opinions. We find that (ii) economic deprivation is an important correlate of more restrictive immigration opinions, (ii) immigration opinions respond thermostatically to immigration policy, (iii) the non-asylum inflow of foreigners further restricts immigration opinions, and (iv) the immigration positions of government and opposition parties have antithetical effects on immigration opinions.

The connection between populism and democracy is widely researched. Most of the literature focuses on populist actors (e.g., parties, leaders, and governments) as it examines the intricacies of this relationship. Some of the resulting takeaways have become embedded firmly in scholarship and are currently considered accepted knowledge across the discipline. Scholars have only recently started focusing on the individual-level relationship between populism and democracy. As a result, our knowledge remains limited and is often based on the assumption that what holds for populist actors also will hold for populist citizens. The first part of this article briefly reviews the state of the art on the individual-level relationship between populism and democracy. Drawing from this review, we identify several theoretical and empirical gaps and limitations in the literature that future research should address. We conclude that contemporary scholarship has made important contributions, but more nuanced and targeted research is necessary to comprehensively understand the intricacies between populism and democracy on the individual level.

We know that populism influences turnout and vote choice. Yet, we know surprisingly little about how populism drives broader participation patterns. In this study, we argue that populist citizens are more likely to participate in politics beyond the electoral arena because they hold specific political grievances. Extant literature highlights the multidimensionality of participation but remains ambiguous about how many or what dimensions it entails. We rely on an unprecedented 16-item participation battery from a comparative survey in nine European countries to design distinct theoretical and empirical lenses through which to examine the relationship between populist attitudes and political participation. The former relies on operationalisations from the literature that are confirmed by confirmatory factor analysis, while the latter relies on latent class analysis. Both frameworks return similar results, highlighting that populist citizens are effectively more likely to participate across the board, regardless of the form or classification of political participation.

Although scholars emphasise the contentious relationship of populist forces to (liberal) democracy, less attention has been paid to whether this extends to those who support or oppose populist parties. This article utilises a public opinion dataset from ten Western European countries to analyse how citizens’ conceptions of democracy relate to the behavioural intention to vote for or against populist parties. The empirical analysis shows that positive and negative identification with populist parties is driven by different understandings of democracy: While individuals who are less inclined to liberal democracy but more to direct democracy and authoritarian forms of rule are more likely to sympathise with populist parties, the opposite understanding of democracy predicts opposition to both left-wing and right-wing populists. These findings demonstrate that citizens with positive and negative partisanship towards populist parties are divided in their interpretations about both the conceptual meaning and the normative functioning of democracy.

An important focus of empirical accounts of representative democracy is the policy-opinion nexus. Drawing from the thermostatic model (Wlezien, 1995), this study examines the dynamic relationship between public opinion and immigration policy, one of the more salient issue domains that have reshaped European democracies since the 1980s. As a counter-factual to social identity accounts of immigration politics, this study argues citizens have policy preferences and when immigration policy changes, the demand responds. The result is a known movement between opinions and policy that we describe as an ‘immigration thermostat’. We rely on dozens of high-quality surveys (more than 500 separate series, corresponding to nearly 2,500 marginals) and a dyadic-ratios algorithm to design comparable immigration opinion measures for 13 countries. We find evidence of both public and policy responsiveness for immigration, although not to the same extent. This suggests an asymmetrical ‘immigration thermostat’ but effective representation in the immigration domain across Western Europe.

Populist parties have established themselves across Western Europe, placed liberal democracy under stress, and are the subject of growing interest in research. Nevertheless, two areas have received almost no attention: who rejects rather than supports these parties, and does supporting/rejecting them relate to citizens’ conceptions of democracy? This paper addresses this gap. By relying on a novel public opinion dataset of ten West European countries with a set of indicators for positive and negative partisanship, and various conceptions of democracy, we explore if those who “love” and “hate” populist parties share or differ in how they understand democracy. Findings include that those who like (dislike) populist parties give less (more) importance to liberal democracy and more (less) to direct democracy. Moreover, we reveal that those who reject both populist radical left and populist radical right parties tend to share the same understanding of democracy based on liberal and egalitarian values.

Citizens’ support for redistribution varies largely between and within countries. An important empirical challenge in this field is the scarcity of comparative data, which this study overcomes by designing a novel time-series cross-sectional dataset that spans more than three decades in seven European countries. Using nearly 300 surveys and a dyadic ratios algorithm, we estimate aggregate redistributive preferences for each country, as well as for population strata within countries based on household income. We then ask to what extent support for redistribution varies across the rich and the poor. We find that citizens are not systematically becoming more reluctant toward or more supportive of redistribution. While redistributive preferences of the rich and the poor do not strictly move in parallel, there is no polarization between the two. Moreover, both the demand for redistribution and the preference gap between the rich and the poor evolve in a cyclical way.

The politics around Muslims is particularly contentious in France, where Republicanism and secularism dominate the debate. In this study, we examine how the politics of Muslims finds its way across policy and public spheres. First, we discuss the societal dynamics that contributed to the presence of Muslims. Second, we provide a first estimate of how French citizens as a whole respond to the contentious politics of Muslims and what their aggregate opinions are vis-à-vis Muslims. Third, we discuss how parties and policies reflect the growing Muslim migration. In this regard, we design a unique measure of the policy space related to the contentious politics of Muslims. We find initial indications of democratic congruence between what citizens want and what governments give them. Altogether, we present vital insights related to the contentious politics of Muslims, and more generally the relationship between policy and public spheres in this domain.