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public opinion

September 26, 2025

🧭 Why securing welfare benefits is key to EU enlargement

Ann-Kathrin Reinl Ann-Kathrin Reinl argues that welfare security is the quiet hinge of public support for EU enlargement. Credible guarantees on national benefits blunt fears about costs and migration. If we reassure citizens on welfare, support for a larger EU holds Read more
June 16, 2025

🧭 Why the EU must act before public support for enlargement fades

Dmytro Panchuk Russian aggression in Ukraine triggered a surge in support for EU enlargement — but public goodwill is beginning to fade. Dmytro Panchuk argues that this moment of elite-public alignment is rare and fragile. To seize it, EU leaders must act decisively before war fatigue and populist rhetoric erode the case for widening Read more
February 10, 2025

Limited shift in public opinion on same-sex marriage in Japan

Robert Nordström Despite a series of court rulings challenging Japan’s same-sex marriage ban, public opinion remains largely unmoved. Robert Nordström presents evidence from new survey data which reveals the fleeting influence of judicial action in advancing LGBTQ rights in this conservative society Read more
October 10, 2024

Why governments want to learn about citizens’ preferences

Anja Durovic Democratic governments conduct extensive public opinion research, but we know little about how they use it. When and why do they seek to find out what the public thinks? Opening the black box of government polling in Germany, Anja Durovic and Tinette Schnatterer find governments exploit polls in a highly strategic way. Read more
August 8, 2023

How do French and German voters view arms exports?

Lukas Rudolph The war in Ukraine has focussed attention on public attitudes to arms exports. New research by Lukas Rudolph, Markus Freitag, and Paul Thurner finds that in France and Germany, while a small minority is in principled opposition, a large majority makes nuanced trade-offs when articulating their positions on the issue of arms exports Read more
August 4, 2023

🔮 How populism fails to respect the people

Christian F. Rostbøll We often hear that populist parties offer recognition and make people feel better about themselves. This sounds very innocent. So why does populism often turn into a threat to a pluralist and respectful democracy? Christian F. Rostbøll argues that it is exactly because of the way populism recognises the people Read more
July 20, 2023

🔮 Populist storytelling beyond the buzzword

Kostiantyn Yanchenko Narrative approaches are currently experiencing a golden age in many domains of political science. And yet, when it comes to populism studies, scholars are still rather reluctant to adopt a narrative perspective. Kostiantyn Yanchenko explains why studying populist storytelling can be beneficial for the discipline Read more
June 19, 2023

🔮 Populist radical right voters do not have a monopoly on nostalgia!

Luca Versteegen Luca Versteegen argues that specific emotions like nostalgia are not limited to populist radical right voters. We should therefore be more careful in ascribing emotions to this group, differentiating emotions and refraining from broad ascriptions like the so-called ‘left behind’ Read more

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